“She sure was something, all
right.”Saunders set down the empty mug
in his hand and scooped up his cigarettes to tuck them into a breast pocket of
his shirt.“A first
class beauty making all the right moves.”

Caje swallowed what was left of
his wine, put his glass on the table, and agreed.“Uh huh.It gets a man’s heart pounding pretty fast to
see something like that.You can’t blame
the jokers for going after her.Especially with her teasing them the way she was.”

“You said it, Charlie.”The sergeant smiled at the thought of the
Piper Cub that had repeatedly buzzed a German patrol pinning down Saunders’
squad in a Luxembourg ravine that morning.The Americans had been trapped along a section of the Our River fronting
Dasburg, Germany, when the small reconnaissance plane had appeared out of
nowhere to render them unexpected aid.“If she hadn’t drawn ‘em off and given us time
to lob a couple of grenades their way…another few minutes, and even I would’ve
bet we were in trouble.”

Caje feigned disbelief.“You think so?”

Saunders laughed.“Yeah, I think so.Just like I think we’d better get a move on
here.It’s getting late.”

Caje gathered in his
Chesterfields and lighter.“You figure
we’ll be going up early tomorrow?”

“If I know
the lieutenant.Plus that outpost line’sgotta be manned before sun
up.”

“Yeah, with the front being
so dead that B Company’s allowed to come in, out of the cold, at night, I can
see why.”Caje
closed his eyes for a moment, frowning, then pressed a
hand to his forehead.“Considering the
fog all the time though, I wonder if outposts even make much difference.You can’t see a thing in those woods come
daylight either.I’ll bet that Piper
didn’t get any better scouting done than we did today.”

“Probably
not.But at least the Krauts are working blind
too.”Saunders looked at Caje thoughtfully.“You feel all right out there this morning?”

Caje lowered his hand.“Yeah, okay.Maybe a little sore after using the rifle a while, but
nothing worse than that.”He
quashed an urge to scratch at the sutures lacing up his right cheek.“I guess Doc making me stay off my feet a
couple of days is paying off.”

Saunders nodded.“Uh huh.And keeping you out of
slippery alleys too.”

Caje colored at the sergeant’s
remark, knowing full well it wasn’t a fall on icy cobblestones that had left
him in his banged up condition.It had
actually been a run-in with an old enemy, Sergeant Rafferty, and his hired
goons.Uncomfortable with the subject, Caje smiled anyway.“Yeah, and that too.”

Saunders considered the
scout for a moment, still suspicious of Caje’s claim
that he couldn’t remember much of what had happened to him near the Chateau de Brouscheid the other night.But if the soldier wanted to keep whatever scrape he’d been in to
himself, there wasn’t much that could be done about it.Saunders rose from his chair and picked up
the overcoat he’d draped over its back.“Well, however you busted open that shoulder wound you got in the Huertgen, you look like you could still use some time in
the sack.”He tilted his head toward the
small cluster of empty glasses on the table.“So…?”

“All right,” Caje grumbled good-naturedly, sliding a hand into one of
his trouser pockets for the money to pay off the waiter now standing at his
elbow.“A bet is a bet, I guess.”He shook his head at the thought of the hasty
wager he’d made with the NCO over who would come out on top in the squad’s
latest go-round with the enemy, and handed his money to the server.

“Merci, Monsieur,” the
elderly Belgian said in a Flemish accent, with practiced, if not necessarily
sincere, courtesy.He accepted the
proffered invasion scrip with a slight bow.

Caje rose from the scarred chair
he’d been occupying for the last hour, briefly palmed the man’s shoulder in
appreciation, and echoed his merci.Retrieving
his own overcoat, he trailed after Saunders through the noisy crowd of
soldiers, hopeful prostitutes, and few older locals jamming the tiny
side-street inn.Smoke from several
dozen glowing cigarettes swagged the room’s
atmosphere in heavy folds of eye-watering haze, nearly obscuring the lounge’s
exit, but Saunders navigated his way toward it, droning “Excuse me’s” and “Gotta get through, buddys” until
a particularly boisterous voice disengaged itself from the general din to
shout, “Hey, Goldilocks!”

Saunders stopped so abruptly
that Caje nearly ran into him.Doing an about face, the sergeant scanned the
faces bobbing around the room while Caje tried to
dodge the knees and elbows of patrons carousing nearby.Both men ducked under a tray of drinks being
borne overhead by a harried barmaid and narrowly missed being doused with the
beverages.

“Over here, you sawed-off
little SOB!’ the owner of the voice shouted again.“Are you as blind as you are hardheaded?”

Saunders squinted at a
shadowy corner at the back of the room and returned, “Farrington!Are you as drunk as you are irritating?”

Sergeant Michael Farrington
of the 110th Regiment, 28th Infantry Division guffawed
enthusiastically and stood to wave his long-time acquaintance over.“I sure am, you no account, good for nothing,
sway-backed army mule!Get yourself over
here and have a round of chock on me and the boys!We’re buyin’.”

Amused but wary, Caje watched to see what Saunders’ reaction to this
unusually phrased invitation would be.

The squad leader grinned but
remained where he was.“I can’t tonight,
Mike…Pat…Eddie,” he called, nodding in turn at each of the men clustered around
a tiny table nearly as battered as Farrington’s weather-beaten face.Saunders raised a hand to gesture his time
wasn’t his own.“I’ve got a war to fight
in the morning.Besides, you sorry
excuse for an Irishman, I’m not thirsty any more.”

“Aw, hell, Saunders,”
Farrington dismissed the other man’s words with an impatient wave of his own
hand, “what war?Ike’s gonna have us all home for Christmas in another week and a
half.Didn’t you get your wire from him
this afternoon?And who cares if you’re
not thirsty?We sure as hell are!Get over here and buy us a drink.”

It
was an invitation Saunders couldn’t refuse.Laughing, he shook his head in resignation and glanced at Caje.“I’m gonna get ‘em set up, then head
over to the chateau.If anyone’s still
awake when you get back, pass the word it’s moving day tomorrow, bright and
early.I want things buttoned up by the
time I get in.”

“Okay.You want me to pick up Kirby?”

“Yeah, take him home and
tuck him in.”

“You got it.”

The sergeant moved toward
the corner as Caje pushed off through the crowd once
more.Somewhere in the room, a GI began
playing a piano, and Caje recognized the familiar
strains of Lili Marlene.He smiled at the thought of going home, maybe
one day soon now, and hearing his own kind of music again – music that spilled
from the darkened doorways of cavernous bars and smoky jazz clubs, beckoning
passersby to stop in for a tumbler of bourbon and a helping of New Orleans
blues.

He reached the small
vestibule fronting the inn and, squeezing past a buxom girl in the hungry
embrace of a corporal from second squad, angled for a narrow staircase in the
corner.Cheap oil paintings of Rubenesque women lounging among silk pillows and admiring
cherubs graced the entry’s walls, the pictures’ heavy burnished frames almost
lending the watering hole a measure of class.Caje wondered whether the Germans had missed
them in their looting or the enemy simply had better taste in art.

He climbed the steep, uneven
steps leading to the second floor of the building, easing his way into his coat
and pulling on his beret.He knew where
to find Kirby.There were six rooms at
the top of the stairs, all with steeply pitched ceilings, once-garish wallpaper
now tamed by age, and just enough space to house the beds being rented
inside.Kirby would be in Antonia’s
sheets.

Caje crested the upper rise and
entered a dimly lit hallway.He spotted
Jan Haanstra seated on a stool at the end of the
corridor, the burly man’s club propped within easy reach against a nearby
wall.Caje
nodded an acknowledgment, and Haanstra nodded back,
knowing the dark GI was here to retrieve the noisy one.

Caje moved to the second door on
the left and, rapping on it, called, “Hey, Kirby!Time to fall out, buddy.You’re wanted, front and center.”

The sound of a man laughing
beyond the door ceased, and Caje knew Kirby had heard
him.But he also knew the randy soldier
wouldn’t come along quietly.Kirby would
have to be threatened, if not flat-out dragged from the room.The guy was as predictable as his choice of
recreational activities.Caje waited a few moments, then
briefly pounded on the wood, shouting, “Come on, Don Juan!You don’t get out here in another ten
seconds, and I’m coming in after you.”

This time, Kirby yelled
back.“Aw, Caje!Ain’t you got no decency?Why don’t you go bother somebody else for a
change?I’m busy!”

Caje sighed and closed his
eyes.He wasn’t up to this tonight, but
he doubted telling that to Kirby would make much difference.There had to be a better way to go about
this.Mulling over his options, Caje decided to outflank his squad mate.Maybe that would work to speed things
up.Leaning in toward the door, he
shouted in French, “Antonia!If you’ll
come out here, I’ll pay you what he paid you, and you’ll have more cigarettes
for doing less.You’ll be able to go
home and get some rest.”

Within seconds, a woman’s
voice could be heard speaking, followed by her partner’s protests and the
sounds of someone moving about inside the room.Then the door opened and Antonia appeared.Nearly twenty-two, she was attractive,
disheveled, and obviously tired. She
smiled wanly at Caje, and he returned a smile of his
own before pressing a pack of smokes into her hands and tilting his head toward
the stairs.She understood he wanted her
to leave quickly, and with a nod of thanks, she slipped past him.

Kirby, struggling into his
shorts, arrived at the door a moment later.“Where yagoin’,
honey?” he called after her.“I love
you.Whatever he said ain’t the truth!”

The girl continued to descend
the stairs and was no longer visible from the hallway.Music and conversation drifting up from the
floor below swallowed her footsteps, and Kirby grimaced in disgust.

“You’re a helluva friend, you know that?’ he said, turning to go back
into the room.

Caje grinned and pushed the door
fully open, to lean against its jamb.“So buy yourself a new one.”

“Whattaya
think I was doin’?” Kirby retorted,
padding to the bed to retrieve a cigarette from a small table wedged against
its headboard.He lit the Camel and,
leaving it to hang from a corner of his mouth, reached for his pants.

“It’s a tough war,” Caje said absently, eyeing the bed and wondering what kind
of accommodations they would find beyond Clervaux the
following night.

“Yeah, and you ain’tmakin’ it any easier.”Kirby buttoned his pants, then dropped onto
the quilt spilling off the worn bolster and began pulling on his socks and
boots.“If it weren’t for my trustin’ nature, I’d think you wastryin’ to bust up my love affair.”

Caje laughed.“You’d call ten minutes in an alley with one
of those commandos in Piccadilly a ‘love affair.’ ”

Kirby gave up.“You’re becomin’ a
cynic, Caje.And that ain’t right for a Frenchman.”He retrieved his shirts and a belt that were
slung around a bedpost.“Where’s Sarge?”

“Downstairs.He wants us out of here and back at the
chateau.We’re pulling up stakes in the
morning.”

“What for?He’s tired of soakin’
up the local culture?”

“He’s big on following
orders.”Caje
leaned forward to scoop Kirby’s coat off the floor before flinging it at
him.“You didn’t think we were going to
stay here forever, did you?”

Kirby peeled the coat from
his face and chest, and stood.“What,
and miss out on the chance to be wet and cold and hungry and miserable, sittin’ in another foxhole somewhere?”He wrestled his way into his coat and picked
up the scarf he’d dropped on the floor earlier.Draping it over his head, he knotted it in place under his chin.“Fat chance of anyone lettin’ that happen.”

“Well, then why not just
accept your lot in life with a smile on your face?Think how much happier you’d be that way.”

Kirby scooped up his
cigarettes and wallet from the bedside table and crossed the floor.Squeezing past Caje,
he muttered, “How can anyone be happy when everybody’s forever takin’ all the fun out of the war?”

Caje shook his head and followed
his friend downstairs.At the bottom of
the staircase, the two men eased their way around the couple still entwined in
one another’s arms.Kirby briefly tried to
catch the woman’s eye over her partner’s shoulder before dropping his cigarette
butt and pulling open the inn’s heavy front door.Stepping outside, he gasped at the frigid
night air as Caje nudged him forward into it and pulled
the door shut behind them.

Both soldiers descended
several steps to the street.They walked
briskly north, their breaths trailing them in vaporous plumes.Caje watched
doorways and the breaks between the buildings they passed, while Kirby talked
to him through the flapping ends of his scarf.

“You know, Caje, I ain’tkiddin’.That Antonia’s really somethin’.I wouldn’t mind livin’
in a dugout so much if I could do it with somebody like her.I mean, it’d sure beat sittin’
in a hole with you all the time.Except
that I don’t know if I could afford it, with the way she charges for
everything.Maybe it’d be cheaper just
to make an honest woman of her.You
know, she an’ me, we could get hitched or somethin’
like that.Right here in town.And then when the war’s done in a couple of
weeks, I could take her back home with me, to the States.Get settled into a brownstone somewhere,
maybe over on the east side.And find a
decent job doin’ somethin’
that’d pay enough to keep her an’ me in beefsteaks and beer.And let us go out every once in a while
too.Like down to Hoxie’s Dance Cabana
over on West Eighty Sixth Street.Or Little Celia’s Saloon up on Third Avenue.Yeah…that might just be all right.You know?I mean, hookin’ up with a dame for life might
not be the worst thing a guy could do.You think?”

Caje shrugged and scratched his
stitches.

“Well, it could be okay,”
Kirby went on, pulling out another smoke.“Havin’ a woman around all the time might pay
off.You take my ol’
lady, for instance…”

“Who?”

“My ol’ lady.You know…my
mother.She was a girl and all that, and
it wasn’t so bad livin’ with her, growin’
up.She’d holler sometimes, sure, but
most times she was all right.She cooked
for me an’ my brother and sister, and washed our
clothes…worried about us some and kept things together after our ol’ man took off.Maybe Antonia’d do just as good.”

“After you run out on her
and your kids, you mean?”Caje glanced over his shoulder at the empty walkway behind
them.

“Aw,
c’mon, Caje.That ain’t what I meant, and you know it.”

The scout looked forward
again, smiling, and resumed his study of the structures lining the street.

“Anyway, maybe you shoulda spent some time with somebody back there tonight
too,” Kirby continued.“We’re gonna be on Kraut turf again pretty soon.There’s no tellin’
if any of them Nazi aprons’ll be friendly.”

Caje said nothing, but pulled his collar up around his
face and held it closed at his throat.

“You coulda
got someone.You don’t look that bad.”Kirby eyed his friend a moment, taking in the
cuts and bruises marring Caje’s features, then
frowned.“Well, okay…you do.But those kinds of girls don’t care about nothin’ like that.”

Caje dodged a patch of ice and
grimaced at the sudden movement’s effect on his left shoulder.“Kirby, didn’t you pay attention to any of
those movies they showed us before we got over here?”

“Sure, I did.But look at you an’ me, and tell me which one
of us looks and feels lousy.It ain’t me, pal.And
I’ll tell you somethin’ else too – if I was you, I’d
let the sarge in on what happened the other
night.With you bein’
in no shape right now so’s the two of us can go take
care of Rafferty ourselves, the guy’s gonna get off
scot-free.At least Sarge’d
get ‘im hauled in on charges.”

“Yeah, and then I could
testify about what you, me, and Billy were up to in Pontgouin
after the sergeant left you in charge, right?Not a chance.I’ll catch up with
Rafferty myself.”

“But leavin’
town tomorrow’s gonna mean leavin’
him behind too.”

“It doesn’t matter.I’ll see him again.”

“Yeah, but suppose you
don’t?”

Caje looked at his companion.

Kirby shrugged.“Okay.I guess you will.But I’d better
be there too, ‘cause it ain’t like I don’t have a
stake in this thing myself, y’know.”He watched Caje
turn to check the street behind them a second time.“The dirty son of a bitch, gettin’ a gang together to jump a guy out walkin’ on his own…well, except for that kid that was with
you.How’d you keep her from talkin’ anyway?”

Caje looked forward again.“She didn’t see anything after Rafferty used
her to set me up.And I asked her to
stay quiet about what she did know, to keep her safe.Rafferty’s got a long memory.I don’t want him going after her some day.”

“So where’s she now?”

“Pontgouin.I got Doc to
set it up with Angelique and the other girls at St. Marie’s after the
lieutenant gave it the okay.”Caje dipped his head as a gust of icy air rushed past.“She ought to be in good hands by now.”

Kirby snorted.“Don’t I know it.”Then he laughed.“And don’t I still wish I was in them hands too.”

“Yeah?What about Antonia?”

Kirby launched what was left
of his cigarette into the darkness.“Who?”

Caje laughed too, and both men
turned a corner to approach the imposing chateau looming ahead of them.The centuries-old structure standing on the
eastern end of a forested ridge overlooking Clervaux
was shrouded in heavy fog; the firing apertures crowning its heights, once the
bastion of twelfth century soldiers wielding crossbows, brooded overhead in
gloomy darkness.Thick wooden doors
flanked by entry towers stood open to admit the American troops garrisoned
there, and on warmer days GIs sometimes engaged in pickup games of baseball in
its cobbled courtyard.While the
fortress once owned by ancestors of Franklin D. Roosevelt lacked a moat, Clervaux’s most prominent landmark resembled nothing less
than a small medieval castle.

“Home, sweet home,” Kirby
observed, tilting his head, trying to see the outline of the chateau’s
moss-covered walls and stately turrets.“I’m sure gonna miss the joint.”

Caje, beginning to relax now that
the buildings on either side of them had fallen away, agreed.“We’ve stayed in worse places.”

“I’ll say.In fact, I wish we’d stay in this here town
for the rest of the war.It’d suit me
just fine.You think we’ll ever get back
here?”

“I doubt it.The war’s moving forward.”

“I guess.”Kirby frowned and reached up to rein in the
ends of his scarf.“But you never
know.We could get lucky.”

Caje supposed there wasn’t any
harm in agreeing with that.“Yeah.You never
know.”

“Saunders.”

Hanley had barely laid a
hand on the sleeping man’s shoulder when Saunders became fully awake.Pushing himself up onto an elbow, he dragged
a forearm over his eyes, glanced at his watch, and squinted up at the figure
leaning over him.“Lieute…”Saunders cleared his throat and tried
again.“Lieutenant?”

Backlit by a hallway wall
fixture’s glow spilling into the room from the partially open doorway behind
him, Hanley squatted next to the antique recamier
serving as the sergeant’s bed. Speaking
in low tones, he said, “I know it’s only 0300, Saunders, but I want you to pull
a patrol together and move up to Marnach ahead of the
rest of the company.Another report came
in from the forward positions on noise coming from the woods beyond the Our yesterday.No one
saw anything, but it could mean the Krauts are moving up heavy stuff.I want you to go out there and take another
look around.See if anything’s going on
that we should know about.”

Saunders pushed a tangle of
unruly hair from his eyes and sat up.“You don’t think the Krauts are just marshaling a defense because of the
decoy operation the general pulled off?”

Hanley knew Saunders was
referring to the American “armor” made of papier-mache
that had been driven around near Clervaux recently,
to make it look as though Allied forces were being built up in the
Ardennes.The intent had been to siphon
off German units from the Roer area to the north,
where an attack by the 99th Division and elements of the 2nd
Infantry Division was in the works to seize control of the Roer
River dams threatening the Allied advance through the Siegfried Line.

“Well, nothing’s come down
from the VIII Corps HQ that says any different,” Hanley said, “but the Kraut
patrol you ran into yesterday might have been worried about that Piper for a
reason.Maybe the Krauts are planning a
spoiling attack to divert us away from the dams, and they’re putting things
together after our outposts are withdrawn.That’s where you come in.I want
you to see what their set up is so we can figure out what - if anything -
they’re up to.”

Saunders nodded and
scratched at his ribs.“Then I’ll see
you in Marnach?”

Hanley stood to leave.“Not until tomorrow, so call in your
report.I’ll be here in Clervaux, at the Claravallis
Hotel, for the rest of the day, finishing up paperwork and sitting in on
another meeting with the CO of the 28th.The company’ll be pulling out at 0500 though,
so have your men leave their packs and bedrolls behind.They can go up on the trucks with the rest of
the gear.

“Okay, sir.”Saunders looked around for a moment before
stretching for his clothing draped over a nearby bust of a 15th century
duke.“I hope the Ghost Front’s as dead
as it’s supposed to be, though.”

Hanley smiled at the sergeant’s
pun and nodded.“I’ll see you tomorrow,
Saunders.”Glancing at his watch, he
turned and departed the room.

With his clothes in hand,
Saunders swung his legs over the side of the sofa and began dressing.Five hours of sleep wasn’t much, but he’d
gone out on much less before - and without having almost two weeks of r & r
in a resort town under his belt.What
was left of King Company was beginning to bounce back from the mauling it had
suffered in the Huertgen Forest, and Saunders hoped
they would have another few weeks to take it easy in the quiet Ardennes sector
before joining in on the push to Berlin.He buttoned his shirt and looked around the room.Five of the sleeping forms sprawled over the
beds and chairs scattered everywhere would have to be awakened for the
reconnaissance detail, but the choice wouldn’t be difficult.Saunders knew who he wanted already.

Almost an hour later they
were dressed, fed, briefed, and climbing into the back of a six by six parked
in the chateau’s courtyard.

“Damn, you guys.What does the army think we are?A bunch of Eskimos?They could at least give us a truck with a
roof on it this time.”

“Kirby…”Littlejohn yawned, then
he began again.“Kirby, will you just
get up there so we can all sit down?”

“Well, hell, Littlejohn, you
know we’re gonna freeze sittin’
in the back of this thing again.Look at
this.”He gestured impatiently at the
wooden slats running horizontally down each side of the vehicle’s open,
straw-littered bed. “This thing’s made for transportin’
cows, not people!”

McCall, who was in no mood
for Kirby’s carping, cut in.“Kirby, if
you don’t quit your bellyachin’ and get up there, I’m
gonna pick you up and throw you in.”

“All
right, all right.You don’t hafta
go gettin’ your nose out of joint.”Kirby patted the air in a conciliatory way,
then leaned in toward Littlejohn and said in a confidential tone, “Didja ever meet such a hothead in all your life?”

Littlejohn looked thoughtful
for a moment before putting on his most solemn face.“Never.”

Satisfied, Kirby nodded,
turned, and swung himself up into the bed of the truck.Littlejohn and McCall followed him, grinning
at one another behind his back.

Already seated, Doc was
reapplying a bandage to Caje’s cheek and admonishing
his reluctant patient to keep it on.“You don’t wanna go gettin’
that cut all full of dirt, Caje, or an infection’s
liable to set in.And…” he tilted the
scout’s head to the side, to better see what he was doing, “I want you to keep
your hands off it too.You keep scratchin’ at it like you are, and you’re gonna bust those stitches wide open.”

Caje grunted something that Doc
took to be an, “Okay,” and the medic secured the last piece of tape in place, then released him.“And how’s the shoulder holdin’ up?” he
asked.“Has there been any more bleedin’?”

“No,” Caje
answered, moving his legs out of the way so the other men could sit down
opposite him.“It’s all right.”

“Okay.Well, it’s only a little nick, but I still
think a few more days off your feet’d be the better
way to go.How you opened it up again in
that fall, I swear, I’ll ne…”

“Hey, Doc,” Kirby, now
seated between Littlejohn and McCall, prodded the medic with the toe of a boot,
“you got anything in that bag of yours to keep a fella
warm on a mornin’ like this?”He grinned wickedly and, giving McCall a
conspiratorial nudge in the ribs, added, “Like, say, maybe a hot-lookin’ redhead?”

McCall laughed.“Yeah, and I’ll take a blonde if you…”

Saunders appeared at the
back of the truck and, grabbing hold of the boards, hoisted himself up into it.

“Hey, Sarge,”
Doc greeted the squad leader.“I think
McCall wants you to sit over there by him.”

Everyone laughed and
McCall’s face flushed with embarrassment.Saunders knew something was up but, looking around and glad to see
everyone in place and in high spirits for a change, decided to play along with
them.He crossed the bed, settled in
next to the frowning PFC, and smiled at him.“Well, McCall.It was awfully
nice of you to save me a place.I didn’t
know you cared.”

The other men broke up at
this, and looking at his feet, McCall muttered a string of obscenities.A heavyset corporal swung around the truck’s
rear and, taking hold of its tailgate, slammed it shut.

“Hey, Schuber,
you got any heat for this jalopy yet?”

Schuber grinned past a wad of Doublemint and nodded.“You better believe it, Littlejohn.Got us a heater installed last night.Me and Roger are so hot up there in the cab
that we’re fanning ourselves and about to roll down the windows.”He ducked the handfuls of straw thrown at him
and addressed Saunders.“You ready to
go, Sergeant?”

“You’re taking us up to the Skyline
Drive again?”

“A’yuh.Unless we fall into a
ravine on the way.”

“Then all ready.”

Schuber tossed off a salute and
pretended to mop sweat from his brow as he departed amid a firestorm of
insults.Within seconds, the driver’s
side door of the truck slammed shut, its engine coughed and sputtered into
life, and the vehicle began lumbering toward the chateau’s front gate.The men seated in its back instinctively
huddled together for warmth, ducking their chins into their collars and pulling
their overcoats in tighter around their legs.Gloved hands grasped rifles and adjusted scarves higher over mouths and
noses, while heads bowed into the wind.Schuber shifted gears, and the truck shuddered, then
lurched past a pair of MPs standing on either side of the exit leading to the
street.The vehicle rolled down a short
incline before turning left onto the avenue bordering the fortress’s
walls.Minutes later, it merged onto the
Dasburg-Bastogne Highway, then crossed the creek-sized Clerve
River and began laboring its way up to the front.

Saunders knew it would be a
while before they reached the drop-off point.The narrow route taking them the few miles from Clervaux
to the St. Vith-Diekirch Highway – better known by
the Americans as the Skyline Drive – was a slippery series of hairpin turns and
icy macadam running up and down wooded mountain terrain.To drive it in the daytime, in good weather,
was a challenge; to navigate it in the pre-dawn darkness, using only blackout
lights to illuminate the way, was nearly suicidal.But Schuber had
done it the previous morning, and Saunders figured there wasn’t any reason why
the corporal couldn’t do it again.PFC
Roger Ludington, Schuber’s assistant driver, usually
manned the .50-caliber machine gun in a ring mount on the cab’s roof, when the
two men ran supplies, but now he was acting as an extra pair of eyes to make
sure the vehicle stayed on the road.

“Kirby,” Littlejohn’s
irritated voice interrupted the sergeant’s reverie, “what are you trying to
do?Climb into my coat with me?Back off and give me a little room, will
you?”

Littlejohn frowned, and
Kirby, intent on taking advantage of the bigger man’s size, leaned in even
closer to him.McCall followed suit,
pressing himself into Kirby, and Doc and Caje shook
their heads at the sight of the soldiers squashed together opposite them.

Saunders eyed them for
another moment as well, hoping they wouldn’t all tumble backward in his
direction as the six by six continued its steep climb up the mountainside.He hugged his Thompson closer to himself, then turned to look out over the tailgate once more.Although he couldn’t see it, he knew Clervaux was falling away behind them,
the scenic town nestled comfortably asleep in the deep river valley below.He wished they’d be staying on over
Christmas, but Marnach might be okay.A warm house, some decent food, a place to
sleep other than on the ground – it couldn’t help but beat the holiday he’d
spent last year, shivering on a railway overpass in Italy.

“Say, did you guys hear the
Armed Services report last night that said Glenn Miller’s plane is overdue?”

Doc’s question sparked a
conversation that would keep the men occupied throughout the rest of ride as
they speculated on Major Miller’s whereabouts, discussed the popular
bandleader’s music, then moved on to the rumor that Marlene Dietrich and her
USO Troupe were heading from Diekirch to the nearby
village of Honsfeld, to put on a Christmas show.The truck jounced and jolted over the narrow
mountain passes as the GIs plotted a way to see the performance, argued over
which tunes Dietrich should sing, and voted on the comic they hoped most would
perform.Saunders listened quietly,
smiling at some of their comments while he watched the charcoal landscape and
hung on to the tailgate to keep from pitching forward every time the truck
topped another ridge and plunged down the next icy slope.By the time Schuber
pulled up to the roadblock at Marnach, the squad had
agreed it would most like to see Frances Langford, the sky to the east had
barely begun to lighten, and Saunders had decided he was ready to do some walking.

A barrel-chested MP carrying
a grease gun and a clipboard advanced to the cab, and Schuberidled the engine while talking to him.Saunders stood and jumped from the vehicle,
then waited for his men to detruck.When they’d all done so, he rapped on
Ludington’s window and gave the drivers a thumbs up in
appreciation for the ride.They returned
the gesture, and Saunders led his squad off to the side of the road.

The soldiers clustered
around him and he spoke.“Okay, like I
said earlier, we’re going to the other side of the river to take another look
around.Caje,
you head for the boat, and all of you keep to the right side of the road before
we hit the logging trail.If you’re
having trouble seeing, hang on to the cartridge belt of the man in front of you
‘til things lighten up.Littlejohn,
you’re on the oars.McCall, you’ll row
on the way back.Kirby, you’re getaway
man.I don’t want anyone talking, and
make sure you watch your step on the way down that gorge.It’s steep as hell, and the last thing I need
is someone breaking a leg.You got any
questions?”

The men shook their heads or
shrugged, and Saunders glanced at his watch.Its luminous dial read 0442.“Okay.Then Caje,
lead out.”

Caje slipped his arm from the
sling on his rifle and brought the M1 to a port arms position.Turning around he moved forward into the
heavy mist as the others fell in behind.The chilly fog seemed to swallow them whole, soon isolating them from
the GIs of the 110thInfantry Regiment’s Company B manning the roadblock.It also forced the soldiers in Saunders’
squad to keep to within a few feet of one another so as not to become
separated.As the men walked, hands
occasionally reached out to confirm positions and straighten out the file.

The squad worked its way
along the slippery highway that eventually led to a bombed-out bridge which
had, until recently, tied Luxembourg to Germany.The road’s surface, patched with ice and what
was left of the previous week’s snow, made for hazardous travel.Saunders slid and slogged his way over it
behind Caje, followed by Littlejohn, Doc, McCall, and
Kirby.They all kept to the thoroughfare
for nearly a mile before veering off onto the slick trail that Saunders had
mentioned earlier.It ran roughly
parallel to the roadway and cut through a series of precipitous draws bisected
by icy streams and wooded with silver birches, poplars, beech trees, and
numerous pines.Sometimes grasping at
branches and trunks to maintain their balance and stay on course, the GIs toiled
their way along the path to within two hundred yards of the fast-moving Our.Then Caje stopped, raised his right arm, and dropped into a
crouch.

Saunders followed him down,
all his senses alert as he strained to see and hear whatever might have caused
the scout to signal a halt.The men
behind the squad leader also lowered themselves, sweating now inside heavy
coats and woolen sweaters, and struggling to control their breathing.No one spoke, and for several moments nothing
could be heard but the sound of rushing water and the creaking of trees.It wasn’t until Saunders began to work his
way closer to the lead man that he picked up on low voices speaking to one
another in an area somewhere off to his left.

Saunders glanced backward at
his men, barely able to make out their dark forms lined up along the path.He knew each soldier in his patrol well and
that they, in turn, knew their jobs.None of them would start anything that would interfere with the
mission.They would sit tight and wait
as the Kraut patrol in front of them finished up whatever it was doing and
moved on.

Germans weren’t anything new
in the area.For almost two months, both
the Americans and their Nazi counterparts had been probing into one another’s
lines, testing each other’s strength, grabbing prisoners, and taking potshots
at anyone who got in the other’s way.It
seemed, at times, to be the only real reminder that the war still existed in
this part of the country.Wehrmacht soldiers even crossed regularly through the thinly
spread American lines to visit friends and family on the west side of the Our.Considering this, Saunders didn’t feel undue
alarm.

Still, he hoped they
wouldn’t have to wait too long before gaining access to the boat.He wanted to navigate the river in darkness
rather than paddle across it in full view of any German snipers positioned on
the bluffs lining the opposite bank.As
he crouched in the slush, he checked the time again and saw that it was 0528.Saunders relaxed a little.It looked as if they still had over an hour
before daylight.

Suddenly the gates of hell
banged open, and his heart nearly stopped.The jagged heights of the Skyline Drive erupted in a conflagration of
fire and smoke that tore open the coal-black sky as hundreds of shells whistled
in from the east, hurtling over the river on high trajectories aimed at the
American-held villages in the west.There,
they slammed into their targets with bone-jarring concussions that shook men
from their beds, rent bodies and buildings apart, and sent civilians and
soldiers alike scurrying for cover.Screeching rockets fired from multi-barreled Nebelwerfers
streaked overhead too, their deafening explosions upon impact shattering
everything around them.Within minutes,
German mortars and railroad guns joined in with the 88, 105, 150, and 170
millimeter assault guns pounding the American lines all along an eighty five
mile front running parallel to Hitler’s West Wall.The ferocity of the salvo was incredible.Its suddenness, astounding.

Saunders and his men cringed
on the path, stunned.They had endured
many barrages since landing on the continent but had never seen anything like
this.The voices coming from the
direction of the river could be heard plainly now too as German soldiers shouted
commands and called out replies.From
the direction of Dasburg, engines roared into life and the ominous clanking of
tanks sounded farther in the distance.Whatever the squad had walked into, each man in it knew it was going to
be a hell of a feat to walk back out.

“Shit,” Kirby croaked.

His observation summed up
the situation and galvanized the NCO into action.Saunders reached forward to grip Caje’s shoulder briefly before he rose and turned
around.Passing the rest of the squad, Saunders
tapped each man on the helmet.The
soldiers understood he wanted them to follow, and climbing back up the trail,
they retreated from the river.

Saunders then maneuvered his
way off the path and into the trees.He
reached a patch of scrubby brush and squatted among the brambles.When everyone else had followed suit, he
pulled his scarf away from his face and spoke loud enough to be heard over the
din.

“We’re gonna
stick around until daylight since we need to see what’s going on.After we’ve determined what we can of the
Krauts’ strength and operation, we’ll move back to Marnach
and report in.”

Saunders already knew it was
a German counteroffensive and also wanted to pull back but was well aware of
what would happen if they tried.“Littlejohn, we wouldn’t last fifteen minutes trying
to make it through that barrage.You
know as well as I do that, for now, we’re safer down here with the Krauts.So until they stop the shelling, we stay
put.”

No one else said anything
and Saunders nodded.“All
right.Keep your eyes open and
hang tight.We’ll get out of here as
soon as we can.”

They settled in to ride out
the holocaust, watching the pyrotechnics raging across the western skyline,
wondering when the artillery would let up, and waiting for whatever the dawn
would bring.Minutes crawled by as leg
muscles cramped and fingers turned numb.The bitter December temperature began to take its toll on first one man,
then another.They shivered as their
sweat-soaked clothes turned clammy, and several of them sat or knelt in the
patchy snow, only to feel more miserable as their coats, trousers, and long
underwear became wet.Occasionally a
shell would strike overhead, impacting against the upper slopes of the
ridgeline, and someone would issue a muffled curse.

It wasn’t until they’d
decided nothing could be left of the American lines that the barrage suddenly lifted
and only the sounds of Wehrmacht men and machinery
continued to traverse the river valley.Saunders’
squad remained in place, straining to hear with ears still ringing, trying to
see anything – anything at all – through the drifting smoke and gloom.Finally the sergeant tapped knees and arms,
signaling everyone to get up.He stood
himself and cautiously moved out of the brush while, following him, the rest of
the soldiers worked their way back to the path.

Moving among the lifeless
cornflowers, poppy stalks, and mustard plants without making noise proved
difficult; the frozen underbrush snapped and crackled as the men forced their
way through.Once, someone’s rifle
banged against a tree and everyone froze.The tempos of their pulses increasing, their fingers curling into the
trigger guards of their weapons, the GIs waited and wondered if the Krauts had
heard.But when nothing came of it,
Saunders waved them forward, and the squad moved on.

They reached the logging
trail and Saunders directed Caje back to the point
position, this time to lead them west again, the rest of the way up the
promontory.The high ground would allow them
to observe the make-up of the German forces, as well as determine the status of
the wrecked bridge the enemy undoubtedly intended to rebuild or replace.The soldiers fought to keep their footing on
the soggy lichen carpeting the rocky path beneath them.They had barely made it halfway to the top of
the ridge when the entire landscape was abruptly bathed in an unnatural glow.

McCall reacted first.“What the hell…?” he gasped, dropping to the
ground and landing heavily on the bandolier filled with M1 clips slung across
his chest.

The others dove into the
frost-covered heather and bracken lining both sides of the trail, all of them
awed and shaken by the otherworldly illumination of the countryside.From the east, massive searchlights bounced
their beams off the low-hanging cloud cover, flooding everything for miles with
unearthly light.As far as the small
band of Americans hugging the side of the ridge was concerned, it might as well
have been high noon.

“Sarge?”It was
Littlejohn again.Waiting
for orders.Waiting
for an explanation.Waiting for the signal to begin a marathon.

The enemy obliged him with
the signal.McCall grunted as the round
from a G43 slammed into his lower back, scant inches from his spine, and plowed
through his abdomen.

Doc dove for the stunned
soldier, grabbing McCall’s left arm and yanking him to his feet.The others opened up on the indistinct
figures suddenly blasting at them from the pathway, farther down below.Shots from Caje’s
Garand lanced the milky vapor shrouding everything, striking pay dirt first and
directing Saunders, Littlejohn, and Kirby’s enfilading fire.As Germans fell screaming, Doc hauled McCall
the rest of the way up the slope.

On top of the bluff, the
wounded man collapsed.The medic,
steeped in adrenaline, swept him up and over his shoulders, in a fireman’s
carry.As the shootout behind them
increased in volume, Doc wondered if he and his moaning patient would stumble
all the way back to Marnach alone.But Caje, Saunders,
Littlejohn, and Kirby burst over the hilltop in a spray of snow and mud,
panting and red-faced, hands fumbling for clips and magazines to replace those
spent.

“They were right behind us!”
Kirby yelled.“Right
behind us!”

“Littlejohn!Give Doc a hand!” Saunders shouted, crashing
through the underbrush.“Get McCall
across the creek and to the firebreak.We’ll hang ‘em up in the trees while you go!”

Littlejohn
bulleted forward onto the path to catch up to the overburdened aid man.The three men behind him fanned out, flanking
the trail, and twisted around to intercept their pursuers.

The first Germans appeared
on the crest of the ridge, and the GIs opened up on them again.Several men dropped, but others ducked behind
maples and firs to return fire with machine pistols and bolt-action
rifles.The woods buzzed with hundreds
of deadly projectiles splintering bark, snapping tree limbs, and severing pine
boughs.The firefight filled the area
with muzzle flashes and the cries of those wounded.Saunders emptied the magazine in his
Thompson, then grabbing for a reload, shouted at Caje
and Kirby to pull back.

Still getting off bursts
with the BAR, Kirby sprang from his place behind a downed chestnut.He followed Caje
already racing ahead of him to the next copse of trees.When the two reached it, they stopped for a
moment to provide cover for the sergeant now sprinting across the path toward
them.

A potato masher sailed into
the spot Saunders had just vacated.The
stick grenade’s explosion added a thick layer of haze to the foggy
landscape.Taking advantage of the acrid
smokescreen, the GIs also bolted for the creek, using a different route than
the one Doc and Littlejohn had taken.Saunders and his companions raced through the woods, away from the path,
then slipped and slid down a hillside, aiming for the tributary where it
threaded its way along the slope’s base.

Saunders hoped desperately
that the Krauts would follow their tracks and not continue on the trail after
his other men.If he could get across
the creek upstream, there was a chance he could stop the Germans there.To ensure the enemy knew which way to go, he
jerked his submachine gun skyward and fired off a short burst.

The decoy worked.Shouting and firing in response, the Germans
turned to give chase to the three men fleeing cross-country.Saunders, Caje, and
Kirby ran for their lives, all but tumbling down the final yards to the
stream.When they reached its bank, they
dashed across the water’s frozen surface.Howling with bloodlust, their pursuers tore down the slope after them,
plowing through pine branches, dodging fallen trees, and straining to see their
quarry through the ghostly mist.

Kirby slipped and fell on
the ice, three quarters of the way across.Caje scooped up his friend’s helmet as it
skittered past him, while Saunders grabbed the downed man’s arm.Kirby rose, skidded forward to gain the stream’s opposite bank, and clambered over it behind his
squad mates.A few wild shots careened
off to either side of the GIs, but most of the Germans held their fire.They wanted to get close enough to see the
men they were chasing before opening up again.

Saunders didn’t plan to let
that happen.

Scaling the hillside beyond
the creek, he waved Caje and Kirby into a stand of
trees a short distance up from the water’s edge.Positioning himself behind a cluster of
birches a few yards away, he yelled, “The ice!” and gestured at it with the
Thompson.They knew what he meant and
brought up their weapons.Saunders
looped the sling of his own gun around his shoulder before grabbing two
grenades from his webbing.The mist
wouldn’t hamper his targeting at this range.He could see through it nearly to the creek’s other side.Throwing a last look in the direction of his
men, he raised a hand, tipping one of the grenades he held toward the
water.Caje
and Kirby nodded.All they had to do now
was wait for their prey.

They didn’t wait long.In moments a pack of Panzergrenadiers
from the 304th Regiment of the 2nd Panzer Division
thundered onto the ice, following the tracks across its snowy expanse.As the SS men neared the waterway’s middle,
Saunders swung out from behind the tree and hurled the grenades at them.Instantly, Caje and
Kirby drilled the stream’s frozen surface with armor piercing .30-caliber
bullets, perforating the area in front of the surprised Germans.

The grenades detonated, and
those men not immediately killed found themselves suddenly submerged up to
their chests in icy water.Floundering
in the frigid current, they were quickly torn to pieces by the devastating gunfire
ripping into them from the hillside.The
Germans still on the opposite bank fired back wildly, desperate
to halt the gory slaughter going on in the water, but the creek was transformed
into a channel of blood.

Another salvo of heavy guns
opened up in the distance, this time the work of the 630th Tank
Destroyer Battalion supporting the small American garrison in Marnach.It was soon
joined by artillery fire from other American batteries opening up in pockets
along the front as German mortar fire resumed and small arms cracked.Hearing it, the Grenadiers on the opposite
side of the creek disengaged and withdrew, their commander shouting angry
commands and excitedly pumping his arm up and down.

As the Germans scrambled
back up the slope, toward the trail, Saunders knew it could only mean one thing
– enemy troops had already infiltrated the area along the Skyline Drive sometime
during the night.The ground assault had
begun.That, in turn, meant that he and
his squad – along with every other outfit deployed along the Ghost Front – had
their necks on the line.

And Doc, McCall, and
Littlejohn might have run directly into danger.

“Caje!Kirby!”Winded from
the chase and battle, Saunders beckoned to the two soldiers.They joined the NCO, their faces ruddy, their
mouths chugging clouds of vapor into the air.

Kirby spoke first.“Where’d they go?” he gasped.“You see how they took off like that?I thought they’d split up, then work their
ways past the busted ice to come after us.”

“They’ve got bigger fish to
fry,” Saunders panted.“The Krauts want
those roads up there, and they’re planning to take out our strongpoints
to secure ‘em.And that includes Marnach, so…”

“Sarge,
we got company!”Caje
was looking past the squad leader, up the hillside at Saunders’ back.

Saunders snapped his head
around.In seconds, German shouts and
the sounds of men climbing the reverse side of the slope could be heard
plainly.

“They picked up on our
firing!” Kirby exclaimed.“They’re on
this side of the creek too!”

Saunders pushed the soldier
forward.“Get to the firebreak!Follow the creek!Go!”

Kirby and Caje took off.Saunders stayed right on their heels as they fought to keep their
footing on the uneven terrain.All three
men dodged the areas still covered with snow, hoping to leave behind as few
tracks as possible.They ran for a time
along the waterway, weaving in and out of the trees, and Saunders cast frequent
glances over his shoulder to see if they were being followed.When he decided they weren’t, he signaled the
others to slow down.

They did so, braking to a
more reasonable – and quieter – pace.The
strange artificial light overhead gave the misty woods a surreal, spectral
look, but it also aided their travel.It
wasn’t long before they rounded a bend in the stream and began aproaching the footbridge that extended the logging trail
over the creek.

Kirby looked back to the NCO
for directions.Saunders motioned him to
move left so they would remain in the woods on a course running parallel to,
but south of the trail.The Panzergrenadiers might have returned to the path, and
Saunders didn’t want to fight them for its use.He planned to pick up the rest of his men before any more situations
developed, then take things from there.

Kirby nodded and veered
west, leading them up the slope and away from the creek.Moving deeper into the forest’s gloom, the
three GIs listened to the distant booming of artillery and wondered how many of
the enemy had infiltrated the sector.Already, their first run-in with the Krauts had proved costly; McCall
had caught a bullet before anyone had even realized what was happening.

Without warning, a hulking
figure sprang out from behind a pine.Kirby
yipped and twisted sideways.Caje threw his rifle to his shoulder, but a split second
before squeezing off a round, he recognized the threat.

“Littlejohn!” he gasped, jerking
his head away from the M1.

Saunders skidded to a stop
beside the scout, also stunned at the big man’s appearance.“What’s going on?” he asked in a sharp voice.“Where’s Doc?”

Littlejohn, shaken as much
as the others, took a moment to wipe his forehead with the back of a gloved
hand.“He’s over there by some stumps,
trying to help McCall.”He pointed first
one way into the fog, then another.“We
had to get off the path ‘cause Krauts were coming up behind us,
and McCall’s in real bad shape.I
figured if Doc didn’t get him fixed up and quiet, we’d never make it to the
firebreak.”He exhaled deeply and shook
his head.“But then you guys showed up,
and you really scared me.”

“We scared you?”Kirby was beginning to recover from his own shock and spoke as quietly
as his raw nerves would allow.“You’re the one jumpin’
out from behind trees, scarin’ people half to
death.You’re lucky we didn’t fill you
full of lead, you…”

Caje stepped around Kirby, moved
off into the shadows, and disappeared.

“Littlejohn, I want you to
show me where Doc is.If McCall’s ready,
we’ve gotta get moving.”

“Okay, Sarge,”
Littlejohn said, bringing up his rifle and also squeezing by the BAR man.

Saunders turned to follow,
but Kirby, noticing McCall’s blood smeared on the front of Littlejohn’s coat, grabbed
the sergeant’s sleeve.

“Hey, Sarge?”
he said.“Since McCall’s my assistant
gunner, I think I oughta be the one to go with
you.Maybe there’s somethin’
I could do to help.”

Saunders saw the worry on Kirby’s
face, but he had no choice; Littlejohn knew the way to the stumps.Clasping Kirby’s arm, Saunders said, “You stay
here and watch for Krauts.You don’t
know where McCall is.”

Kirby looked disappointed,
but he nodded, and Saunders moved past.

Turning his head and looked
faintly amused, Saunders added, “Get yourself behind that tree too, but don’t
scare Caje when he gets back, huh?The guy’s liable to shoot you and let all the
Krauts know where we are.”

Kirby blinked, then he curved his lips into a smile.“Yeah, okay.”He pulled up the BAR and began edging his way around the tree.“I’d hate to put you guys in a bind that way.”

Saunders returned his
attention to Littlejohn.Already, the
larger man was a number of yards ahead and quickly fading into the trees.Saunders double-timed to catch up, then followed him to several jagged stumps rising from a
mound of rotting tree trunks.

Doc was hunched behind them,
trying to soothe the wounded man moaning and whimpering on the ground in front
of him.Saunders’ stomach muscles
tightened at the sound of McCall’s suffering, and unconsciously, he took
several deep breaths.It was never easy
for him to see one of his men down, but he considered it a threat when it was
someone he’d come to know and respect.McCall had been a latecomer to the unit, a replacement like a hundred
other GIs before him.Only he’d survived
long enough to become one of the squad’s ‘old men’.And the old men were the ones Saunders most
dreaded losing, especially this late in the game.He couldn’t afford the distraction of grief,
nor the toll it took on his judgment.His time wasn’t his own.

He
wiped a hand across his dry lips and skirted the stumps.Doc looked up at Saunders’ arrival and sat
back on his heels.Bloodied and
coatless, he seemed unaffected by the cold.In contrast, McCall, lying face down on his own coat and covered with
the medic’s, was shivering violently.

Saunders unbuckled his web
belt.He handed it to Littlejohn and
stripped off his own overcoat.“McCall,
take it easy,” he said, kneeling at the agitated soldier’s side.“Just take it easy.”He laid the coat over the medic’s and, with
Doc’s help, tucked it in around the wounded man.

McCall moaned and attempted
to lift his head, but the clothing restricted his movement.Squeezing his eyes shut, he dropped forward
again and resumed his incoherent muttering.

Saunders looked at the man
opposite him.“How is he, Doc?”

“He’s bad, Sarge.”Doc shook
his head and spoke in a low voice.“Real bad.The bullet
went in near his spine, and from the looks of it, probably up through his
middle.I’d guess it’s lodged somewhere
underneath his diaphragm, maybe in his liver.He’s hemorrhagin’ inside and been vomiting
too, so he’s dehydrated.But since he’s
gut shot, he can’t have any water.And
you see how gray he is?That blue color
around his lips?”

Saunders peered at McCall
and nodded.“Shock?”

“Uh huh.Even with his head down lower than the rest
of him on this slope, it’s not doin’ ‘im any good.In this
cold, shock sets in real quick.And
without a way to get him warm and keep him that way, he doesn’t stand a
chance.”

“Then we’ll get him
back.”Saunders jerked his head up.“Littlejohn.Give me my belt and go round up something for
stretcher poles.Make sure they’re…”

“It won’t help, Sarge,” Doc interrupted him, his voice very quiet.“McCall’ll never
make it.”The medic’s eyes dropped as he
carefully picked a few leaves off the coats covering the soldier.“He’s dyin’ right here, and there’s nothin’ we can
do about it.”

Saunders’ shoulders
sagged.It had all happened so fast,
just like it had with a hundred other guys.Long.Temple.Walton.Cooper.Hacker.Crown…The dying just went on and on and on.The war was a monster chewing everything up and spitting it out
again…broken, ruined, and dead.Saunders
wondered bitterly if anything would ever stop it.

I’ve got a war to fight in the morning…a war to fight in the morning…a
war to fight…

The words he’d spoken the
night before continued to echo in his mind as his eyes fell on his
Thompson.Saunders rubbed his lips
again, then lifted the gun from his lap.“Okay.Well, how much time has he got left?”

Doc shrugged.“I don’t know.But not much.”

Saunders tightened his grip
on the submachine gun and looked at Littlejohn once more.“Go get the branches.We’re not staying, so McCall’s coming with us
anyway.”

“Okay, Sarge.”Littlejohn sounded very somber.“Do you think McCall oughta
have my coat too?”He put a hand to his
chest to begin unfastening buttons.

“No.We’ll use that for the litter.Get going.”

Littlejohn lowered his hand
to retrieve the pick-mattock hanging from his cartridge belt and turned for the
woods.As he lumbered off, Saunders
stood to take over security.He walked a
short distance away from the sad spectacle at his back and willed his mind to
think about something else.There were
plenty of things from which to choose - what the Krauts were up to, how big of
a push did they have on, what was happening in Marnach,
how long would it take to get back there, what kind of report would Caje bring in, did battalion know what was going on yet…”

“What
is it?What is it?”McCall’s sharp cry cut through the sergeant’s
thoughts and severed his concentration.Saunders turned to see the wounded man suddenly thrashing beneath the
makeshift blankets covering him.McCall’s voice quickly grew louder as his agitation increased.“It’s not…it’s not what I thought…it’s
not…let me up!Let me up…!”

Saunders rushed to the
panicked GI’s side, dropped to his knees, and also tried to restrain him.“McCall, hold still.Hold still!”He grabbed for the soldier’s right hand and, grasping it tightly in his
own, pulled it toward himself.Leaning
in near the back of the writhing man’s head, he urged, “Take it easy,
McCall.Take it easy!It’s me - Saunders!Do you hear me?It’s Saunders!”

McCall twisted at the sound
of the squad leader’s voice and choked, “Please…please!Help me!I can’t, I’m not…I can’t…!” before he suddenly went rigid, the veins in
his temples standing out in dark relief behind eyes that were wide and
frantic.His words became horrible
gagging noises as he struggled to breathe.Doc and Saunders both hung on and tried desperately to aid the wounded man,
but within seconds McCall collapsed.Curling in on himself, he expelled the last of his air and fell silent.

For a moment Saunders had no
thoughts, none at all.He felt the dead
soldier’s fingers relax in his grip, but he continued to grasp the GI’s hand,
unwilling to let go.He dropped his gaze
to take in McCall’s slack expression, the sightless eyes, his prematurely gray
hair framing a deeply lined face, and could see, not for the first time, that
the man had grown much too old before his time…grown old while fighting a
‘young man’s war’...a war that took young men and made them ancient before they
were thirty.

Finally he opened his hand
and noticed McCall’s was bare; his glove had come off at some point during his
struggling.The PFC’s hand was clean,
the stark white fingers splayed across the sergeant’s gloved palm unsoiled…not
yet dirtied with the day’s business of killing.There was no grime under the nails, no blood smeared on the palm, no gun
oil or grease staining the fingertips.McCall’s hand was spotless.And
it would stay that way, now that the man would no longer be handling anything,
holding anyone, reaching for…

“Sarge,”
Doc quietly interrupted the sergeant’s thoughts, “you’d better put your coat
back on before you catch a cold.Here…”
the medic carefully lifted it away from McCall’s body and proffered it toward
the NCO, “you’re shivering.”

Saunders looked at the coat,
then into the medic’s eyes, and realized numbly that it was time to get on with
business.He reluctantly allowed McCall
to slip from his grasp and reached for the clothing.Slinging it around his shoulders, he made
himself dismiss his feelings and focus on the man watching him – one of the men
he still had left - and he cleared his throat.“You too, Doc,” he said.“Get
your coat on.You catch the flu, and
nobody’s gonna want you working on him.”

Doc shared the sergeant’s
forced smile and nodded, then he turned to scoop a
mound of snow into his hands.Rubbing it
over his fingers, palms, and wrists, he began washing McCall’s blood off
himself.

Saunders felt unsettled
while watching this, so donning his pistol belt, he
turned his head and scanned the woods for signs of Littlejohn.

When Doc finished with the
snow, he asked, “You want McCall’s Ronson, Sarge?”He gingerly
peeled his overcoat away from the corpse, relieved that he’d thought to place
it lining-side-up on the GI so that McCall’s blood only wet the outside.The medic shrugged his way into the coat and
continued, “Since the lighter’s engraved, the Effects Quartermaster probably oughta ship it back home to his folks with the rest of his kit.”

“I know,” Saunders said,
closing his eyes for a moment before turning back to the aid man.“See if he’s got anything else on him they
might want too.And get one of his tags,
will you?”

“Yeah.”The word came out sounding as dry as Doc knew
his mouth to be, but he hoped the squad leader hadn’t noticed.After all, Saunders didn’t need to worry
about anyone else’s grief.The man had
plenty enough to worry about as it was.

Saunders, taking in McCall’s
bloody back bisected by a swath of bandages, hadn’t heard.Instead, he was staring at the red smears
visible through McCall’s shirt and sweater neatly cut up the center, then fallen off to his sides as he suffered his death throes.Saunders wondered if it was a good thing
McCall had gone so fast.If nothing
else, the soldier wasn’t suffering any more.

Now if that were only true of
the rest of them…

Doc straightened up and
handed the noncom the lighter, a wallet, a dog tag, and a pair of dice.Saunders stashed them away in his own pockets
and realized McCall’s luck hadn’t held up any better this morning than it
usually did when the guy gambled with Kirby.Beating the odds was just never one of McCall’s strong suits.

But so far, it had been one
of his own, and – as much as it was within his power to do so – Saunders
intended to keep things that way.He
reached out to pull the shirt and sweater halves up over McCall’s back, and
after lingering a moment longer, he stood.“Doc, hand me that gear over there,” he said, pointing at McCall’s
bandolier and the assistant automatic rifleman’s belt lying a few feet away
from the medic.“We’re gonna need all the ammo we’ve got.I want the grenades too.He should have a couple of ‘em.”

Doc retrieved the items
indicated and passed them up to the NCO before pulling on his gloves and
repacking his medical supplies.

Saunders looked around for
McCall’s Garand, knowing Littlejohn had brought it from the ridge, and spotted
the rifle lying in some nearby weeds.He
picked it up, unlatched its trigger guard, pulled out the trigger housing, and
lobbed the assembly into a cluster of firs.Walking over to the downed trees next to the stumps, he jammed the M1
out of sight beneath them.Getting to
his feet, he saw Doc standing and waving at Littlejohn now carrying the slim
trunks of two saplings cradled in his arms.

Saunders rested the butt of
his Thompson on his hip, canted the weapon away from himself,
and waited for Littlejohn’s arrival.When
the soldier came near, the sergeant allowed him a few moments to take in
McCall’s still form and absorb the fact that his squad mate was dead.Then he said, “Littlejohn, lose the poles and
come get Kirby’s ammo.We’re moving
out.”

Littlejohn looked up from
McCall’s body, his face pale, his expression guarded, and he nodded.Without a word, he dropped the scrounged
stretcher-makings and moved toward the NCO.Saunders lifted his arm to extend the BAR magazine belt to him, and
Littlejohn took it.After slinging the
belt’s suspenders around his left shoulder to leave the magazine pouches
trailing down his back, he hefted his M1 and fell in behind Saunders and Doc,
who were already moving ahead of him, into the mist.

In silence, the three
soldiers walked the forested distance taking them back to Kirby.Dawn had begun breaking, and they all hoped
its feeble light would soon overtake the artificial moonlight and burn off some
of the fog.The Krauts could be
anywhere, doing anything, and none of the GIs wanted to be caught off guard a
second time.

Approaching Kirby’s
position, they discovered he didn’t want to be caught off guard again
either.Kirby hissed out a
challenge.“Safe!”

Saunders supplied the
countersign.“Sorry.”

Relieved to hear the
familiar voice, Kirby stepped out from behind the tree shielding him from
view.Right away, he noticed McCall’s
bandolier hanging from Saunders’ left arm.

“Where’s…?” Kirby moved his
head left and right, trying to see around the sergeant and past the men
following him.“Where’s McCall?”

“He’s dead, Kirby.”Saunders’ words were blunt and to the point.

Kirby’s eyes widened.“Dead?”He sounded incredulous, uncomprehending.Looking from one man to another, he tried to
gauge the truth of the report by their expressions and sputtered, “Well…well,
are you sure?Are you sure he ain’t just out of it?”

Saunders passed a hand over
his eyes and frowned.Sometimes Kirby
could look so damned young, so vulnerable…as if he were the kid brother of
every man in the outfit...a kid brother who couldn’t stand being left
behind.“I’m sure.”The sergeant hoped Kirby wouldn’t start
anything and tilted his head to indicate the PFC standing behind him, slightly
off to his right.“Littlejohn’s your second
man now.”

Kirby gaped at the soldiers
a moment longer, then simply closed his mouth and looked away.

No one else said anything,
and relieved, Saunders considered the matter closed.“Let’s get going.We’ve got a lot to do today.”He moved past Kirby and headed in the
direction Caje had disappeared earlier.

The others fell in behind,
wrestling with their thoughts and anxieties as they followed him quietly
west.So far, nothing had gone according
to plan, and McCall’s death had left them feeling more vulnerable than usual.The firebreak, only one of many such
corridors cleared of trees and cutting through the Luxembourg woods to control
the spread of wildfires, lay a short distance ahead.For all they knew, it could also be filled
with Germans.And if it were, they would
be trapped, caught between the Our,
the logging trail, and the enemy forces Saunders and Kirby knew to be somewhere
behind them on their left flank.

It was little wonder more
than one of them started in surprise when Caje issued
a challenge a short time later.

“Sorry,” Saunders said quickly,
knowing the Louisianan’s propensity for being fast on the trigger.

The scout materialized from
the fog, lowered his rifle, and drew near to begin his report.“It looks like the firebreak’s clear on our
end of things, Sarge, but farther up, it’s full of
Krauts.They’re not only moving west on
that trail we were using earlier, but they’re veering off at the break too, to
head north.It looks like they’re
getting a pincer effect going around Marnach.”Caje shook his
head.“And if they do, those guys up
there are going to be in for some real trouble.”

“They’re already in
trouble,” Saunders commented, hearing the distant sounds of battle and
wondering how long it would take German armored support to get across the
river.“But any Krauts planning to come
in from the northeast side of town are gonna run into
a helluva lot of mines, so that oughta
slow ‘em down.”

“Yeah,
it should,” Caje agreed.“But there are an awful lot of them.Sooner or later, they could get through.And Sarge,” Caje frowned as he realized one of their own number was
missing, “they’re outfitted pretty good.Lots of burp guns, panzerfausts,
meat choppers, mortars…they mean business.I don’t think we’re set up to meet something like this.”He also noticed Littlejohn toting the BAR
gear.“McCall…?”

The sergeant pulled the dead
man’s bandolier off his arm and held it out.“He didn’t make it.”Looking past
Caje on the pretense of studying the gloom at the
soldier’s back, he added, “And I know we’re not set up to meet something like
this.”He sucked on his lower lip in
frustration as he considered how everyone, from division headquarters on down,
had been caught with his pants tangled around his ankles on this one.And his own squad was out here without a
radio, a plan of action, contact with other units, adequate rations, packs,
backup supplies, and just about everything else they would need to fight their
way home through the nightmare this morning was shaping up to be.With nothing more than a couple of rifles, a
BAR, a Tommygun, eight pineapple grenades, and some
extra M1 ammo, what were the chances of any of them making it?“But you took a look at the Krauts, close
up?”

“Had to.In this fog, it was the only way to confirm
their position.”Caje
tried to keep his voice steady as he situated McCall’s bandolier around his
chest.“I went to the other side of the
break to recon the woods we’ll be going into, since I figure we don’t want to
walk into another mess like we did earlier…”

“Yeah,” Kirby muttered at
Saunders’ back, “we sure as hell don’t.”

“…and although it looks like
a lot of Krauts might’ve been lying in formation over there before,” Caje continued, bringing up a hand to wipe at his eyes,
“they’re not there now.My guess is that
they’re already attacking the roadblock, and the ones on the path are heading
up there to reinforce them.But that
means we should be okay to keep going, since everything to the south of the
trail’s clean.”

“Sarge,”
Doc spoke up, “if the Krauts were all over the place in there earlier, how do you figure we made it past ‘em,
on our way to the river a little while ago?”He shivered inside his coat and knew it wasn’t entirely due to the
cold.“They must’ve heard us goin’ by.Why didn’t
they open up on us while we were walkin’ right
through the middle of ‘em?”

“Because
if they had - and they had guys on both sides of the path - they would’ve been
firing into their own ranks.”Saunders had
a sudden urge to smoke a cigarette but knew it wasn’t the time for it.“Or maybe they were worried about tipping
somebody off to what they had planned for this morning.Or it could be it was too dark for them to
tell we weren’t just some more of them walking through there.”

Hearing all this, the men
appeared even more ill at ease, and Saunders turned back to Caje.“Anything else?”

Caje shook his head.

“Okay.Then let’s go.”

The scout brought up his
rifle and led the others forward.It
took some maneuvering for them to trek through the thick stands of pines.When the soldiers reached the firebreak, they
stopped and crouched in the muck at their feet, straining to see along the
corridor’s length, in both directions.Despite the morning’s growing light, visibility remained poor.They could only hear the German troopers in
the distance, the Krauts speaking freely, singing snatches of WennWirMarschieren, and occasionally breaking out in raucous
laughter.

“Count your blessings,
Kirby,” Littlejohn whispered back.“With
them making all that noise, maybe they won’t hear us traipsing around in these
woods.”

That was what Saunders was
counting on.“Caje,
get over there, and we’ll move on your signal.The rest of you,” he twisted to see their grim faces, “one at a time, in
the same order we’ve been going so far, except this time I’m in the rear.You got it?”

As always, heads bobbed up
and down at the question, and Saunders grunted in satisfaction.He turned back and slapped Caje on the rump.“Get going.”

Caje lifted himself and bolted
out into the open.Within moments, he
was in the brush and barely visible on the firebreak’s opposite side.His squad mates watched as he took in the
view around him, confirming their landing zone was still safe.Then he lifted his rifle to point it at the
woods at his back while waving his right arm to signal ‘forward.’

Doc pushed up and ran into
the clearing.Littlejohn, Kirby, and
Saunders tensed over their weapons, ready to give him covering fire.Making a mad dash for the safety of the tree
line, Doc clutched his medical bag against his chest.He slid through the brush, past Caje and into the woods, then dropped and lay still.Everyone else waited, uneasy and alert, before
following him, one by one.

Reunited, the squad resumed its
journey and struggled through the ravines and across waterways for the rest of
the morning.Without the logging trail’s
footbridges, the men couldn’t make good time.They probed north a few times, hoping to find a spot where the enemy’s
ranks were thin enough to try a breakthrough into Marnach,
but without any success.

Upon reaching the Skyline
Drive, they found themselves forced to fall back farther south, to avoid the
fire being laid down by the five 57 mm cannons being manned by the 630th
Tank Destroyer Battalion defending Marnach, as well
as the twelve infantry companies of the 2nd Panzer Division assaulting it.Saunders’ squad crossed the highway, then
skirted open fields to climb a series of rocky ledges jutting out from a ridge
southwest of the village.

Saunders eventually called a
halt on top of one of the ledges, and the men fell out, exhausted, to rest
along the stony shelf.Canteens appeared
and scarves were loosened as Saunders reached inside his coat for a badly
needed cigarette.He kept an eye on the
shrouded countryside below as he lit the tobacco and inhaled deeply to take in
its soothing flavor.

Saunders
thought he sounded testy, ready to pick a fight, probably worked up over not
seeing McCall a last time, but seeking an easy target not wearing too many
stripes.And Littlejohn would be good
for that too…unless the Nebraskan was feeling sorry for the guy.Then Littlejohn would surrender his canteen
without a battle.He had a thing for
helping a buddy over a rough spot, as he had once put it, and losing a friend
was about as rough as it got.But Saunders
knew coddling a man only helped him to stay so tied up in his emotions the guy
wouldn’t be able to fight the war.So, peering
over the sights of his Tommygun, he said, “Drink your
own water, Kirby.”

“It’s
frozen,” Kirby sniped.

“You
got legs,” Saunders fired back.

“Yeah,
I got legs.”Kirby scowled at the
canteen in his hands before jamming it between his thighs to thaw its
contents.“It’s
buddies I’m runnin’ out of.”

Kirby
huffed at that.“Why bother when I
already know I’m gonna wind up a dead man too, bein’ in a Mickey Mouse outfit like this?”

Saunders
frowned and turned his head.“You got a
problem, Kirby?”

Kirby
ignored the question and kept talking.“ ‘Cause only an outfit with no intelligence would walk
right into the middle of the whole Kraut army like we done earlier.An’ I ain’ttalkin’ about G2 neither.”

Saunders
bristled at that but said nothing.The
other men behind him stirred uneasily.

“‘Course
that might not be a bad thing, bein’ a dead man,”
Kirby went on.“Once all of us end up
that way, maybe the war’ll finally stop.So, what the hell, let’s keep goin’ on the way we are now.Whattayawanna do next, Sarge?”

Saunders had heard enough.“Kirby, I’m warning you…”

“Sarge,” Doc interrupted, alarmed at the turn this
conversation had taken.“Is it okay if
we eat somethin’?I’m feelin’ hungry.”

“Yeah,
Doc, that’s a good idea,” Littlejohn agreed.He had nearly interrupted the conversation himself.“What do you say, Sarge?Is it okay?”

Saunders
said nothing, but struggled to contain his raw emotions and regain
control.They had an avalanche of Krauts
on their tails, and it wasn’t a big enough problem.He looked to the east once more as he took
another drag off his cigarette to calm himself down.Then he said, “Yeah, go ahead.Just don’t fire up
the boxes to heat anything; I want to get moving again.And hold back something for later.It could be a long day out here.”Noticing the ash on the Lucky’s
tip, he flicked it off casually.“But
Kirby, you keep that canteen between your legs ‘til it cools you off.It’ll do you some good.”Saunders picked a bit of tobacco off his
tongue.“Besides, a hothead like you,
you’ll have a drink in no time.”

Deflated
by the dismissal, Kirby dropped his eyes to the icy container in front of him
and moodily toyed with its loosened cap.Doc and Littlejohn pulled out cartons of K-rations, neither man really
hungry, but glad to have something to keep himself occupied in the awkward
moment.Caje
lit a cigarette and smoked it in silence.It wasn’t the first time somebody had taken a death in the squad hard,
and they all knew the score; they all had lost someone.Getting over it took time and giving each
other leeway. It wasn't always easy, but it was how they kept going.

Saunders
knew plenty about grief, and he gave up ground too.Shifting again he said over his shoulder,
“But when you’re done with that water, you better give me a drink of it.”He reached a hand behind his back and patted
the canteen hanging from his own belt.“Mine’s frozen.”

Kirby looked up, startled at
so quickly getting an obvious chance to fall in again.He glanced around at the others and, seeing
their faces, was glad, not for the first time, to be in the company of these
men."Sure, Sarge,"
he said."No problem."

Saunders might have smiled
at that, but he saw movement near the edge of the woods bordering the
meadow.Ditching his cigarette, he
dropped onto his belly and urgently waved down the soldiers behind him.Canteens and frosty tins of corned beef hash
were instantly forgotten as the others also dropped forward to hug the ledge
and bring up their weapons.

No one moved and nothing
could be heard in the wintry silence.After several minutes, Caje inched his way
forward to lie alongside Saunders."What is it?" the PFC whispered.

Saunders stared at the slope
below them and the field and woods beyond, trying for another glimpse of
whatever it was he thought he’d spotted through the fog."Dunno,"
he murmured, aware that his mouth was dry and he really did need a drink.

Shimmering mists undulated
back and forth over the December landscape, opening up a view one moment only
to quickly obscure it the next.When a
spectral form finally seemed to separate itself from flickering images of rocks
and trees, Saunders questioned whether his eyes were playing tricks on him.More shapes soon followed the first, and Caje flicked off the safety on his rifle, confirming
Saunders wasn’t seeing things.

The sergeant turned his head
and whispered, "Krauts," to the men at his back.

Kirby and Littlejohn threw
looks at one another, then also moved up.Doc kept himself low in the shadows of the
rocks, out of the combatants' way.He
couldn't risk drawing fire by allowing the enemy to see the red crosses on his brassard
and helmet.Caje
and Saunders strained to see the unit of Panzergrenadiers
working its way toward their position, and wondered what the Krauts were doing
so far from a strategic objective.

The Germans were engaging in
Hutier tactics, bypassing American strongpoints all along the line.Forward elements of the panzer corps had been
commanded to infiltrate sectors farther west while storm troops following them
mopped up resistance left behind.The
company of the 304th Panzergrenadier Regiment
approaching Saunders’ squad intended to reach the bridges over the Clerve River by slipping between Munshausen
and Clervaux.It had orders to secure the bridges for the spearhead of the 2nd
Panzer Division which would be attacking west toward Highway N-12.

The SS men reached the base
of the hill and shouldered their Mausers and
MP40s.They placed woolen-gloved hands
among the slippery rocks to begin their climb.Virtually hidden by the low cloud-cover, they moved up the slope,
confident of penetrating the American lines without being seen or challenged in
the desolate terrain.

They were wholly unaware of
the threat looming over them.

Saunders signaled his men to
hold their fire.He wanted to take out
as many Krauts as possible while the squad still had the element of surprise.That meant allowing the Germans to get in
close.

It was nerve-wracking work
for the GIs as they waited in the gloom and gauged the enemy’s progress by the
sounds the men below made.The nearer
the Germans drew, the louder the clanking of their weapons and gear became, the
squeaking of their boots and leather greatcoats sounded, the murmuring of their
voices seemed.

Littlejohn grew edgy and
began panting.He expelled such clouds
of moisture into the air that the ledge looked like a dragon was crouched,
hidden, upon it.Saunders reached over
to get his attention and made a chopping motion in front of his own face to
warn him he might compromise their position.Littlejohn snapped his mouth shut and moved his head lower behind his
rifle.

Kirby, lying between the two
men, eyed the terrain in front of him with a mixture of anticipation and
dread.He pushed the ends of his scarf
away from the BAR and silently calculated how much ammunition he had left.Deciding he should have been issued a double
basic load for a combat patrol instead of what he had for a recon, he promised
himself he’d complain about it to Saunders later.

Caje, on Saunders' other side,
lay stretched out behind his M1.He
adjusted and readjusted the position of its butt plate against his shoulder,
aligning the front and rear sights as he settled the walnut stock along his
cheek.Placing his finger on the
trigger, he tried to guess where the first Kraut would make an appearance.

Saunders brushed away the
hair hanging in his eyes and wished the Krauts would hurry.

At last a dark figure
appeared out of the fog.His dusky
overcoat fell open, revealing the autumn-pattern camouflage smock he wore
beneath it.He was so close to the GIs
that they could see the SS runes on his service tunic’s collar jutting up from
the smock’s neckline.He leaned forward
to fumble for another handhold among the rocks, and the Americans also saw that
his rifle was slung across his back.If
the rest of his companions were equally disadvantaged, taking them out would be
easy.

If the enemy scout reached
the ledge before more of his unit showed up, it would mean big trouble.

Saunders leveled his
Thompson and hoped for the best.Another
scout emerged from the mist, then more SS infantrymen.Most of them wore their weapons in the same
fashion as their lead man, to free their hands for climbing.Relieved to see it, Saunders permitted
himself a brief smile.

He knew that Caje had the first scout lined up in his sights.Saunders aimed for a corporal heavily bandoliered with a long belt of ammunition.The soldier was carrying it for his section's
MG42 and was one of the few clutching his Schmeisser.Saunders would have rather nailed the Kraut
lugging the heavy machine gun itself, to keep his cargo out of action, but the
gunner wasn’t visible, so the ammo bearer would have to do.Saunders tightened his finger on the trigger
of his submachine gun and waited another moment for the Krauts to get
closer.Bracing himself for balance, he
let loose with a spate of .45 caliber slugs that made an instant corpse of his target.

His
men opened up a deadly fusillade of their own, mowing down Panzergrenadiers,
left and right.Germans screamed and
twisted in pain as bullets ripped through flesh and shattered bones.Some of the wounded dropped where they stood,
to writhe on the steep slope and shriek for medics.Others fell backward, tumbling down the way
they’d come, leaving trails of blood in their wakes.A few still standing grabbed for rifles and
potato mashers, but they were cut down before they could bring them into
play.Their grenades exploded near them,
spattering the snow with grisly remains.

The
Americans above and Germans shooting blindly below continued to blanket the
area with fire.The noise of battle rose
to a deafening crescendo as the two sides raged at one another.In the poor visibility, they finished off the
wounded casualties lying exposed and helpless.It wasn’t long before only dead and dying men littered the incline.

Finally the Germans pulled
back, and Saunders shouted at his men to hold their fire.The stench of gunpowder, bullet-riddled
corpses, and loosened bowels hung thick in the air.It sickened him and choked the others. A haze
of smoke curtained the ledge from view.Saunders knew it was time to move.

"Caje!Doc!Littlejohn!Get up to that next ledge!Set up
shop, but don't let 'em know you're there.Kirby," he twisted to see the automatic
rifleman, "wait three with me, then follow.You see or hear anything, lay down
suppressing fire!"

Kirby grunted as Littlejohn
crawled over him to follow Caje already climbing up
the slope.Saunders suffered the big
man’s bulk passing over him next but kept his eyes trained on the
hillside.Doc waited for Littlejohn to
go by, then hauled himself up along the boulders, behind the PFC.

Saunders knew they didn’t
have much time.He hoped the others
would reach the ledge quickly, and counted off the seconds before he and Kirby
would make their move.Loose rocks and
pebbles slid down the icy slope, farther and farther off to his left, allowing
Saunders to gauge the men’s progress as they climbed.When he finished counting off three minutes,
he pulled in the Tommygun, tucked it under his arm,
and lifted himself.

“Kirby.Go!”

Kirby gathered up the BAR,
only too glad to put more distance between himself and the Krauts.Crawling past Saunders who was leaning back
to let him get by, Kirby stretched for a clump of brush.He scrabbled his feet on the gravelly
incline, managed to gain a toehold, and began pulling himself up the hillside’s
rocky face.

Saunders waited a few more
seconds, to cover him, then followed.He knew that whatever the Krauts tried, it
would be rough.Having the high ground
meant having the advantage, but the Germans’ superior numbers wouldn’t allow
him and his men to hold it for long.Just running out of ammunition would be enough to do them in.About the best he could hope for was to put a
few more Krauts out of action before the squad took off.

To save time, although
uneasy doing it, he paused and slung his submachine gun over his shoulder.His hands free, he grabbed at a tangle of
exposed roots anchoring a scrawny pine.He struggled to hoist himself to the base of the tree before stepping
sideways to a cleft in a rock offering a level place to stand.After gaining his balance, he shifted his
weight forward and scuttled his way through the dirt, snow, and shrubs that
led, diagonally, to his men.

He passed a cluster of
boulders and could see the outcropping sheltering the squad above him.A hand appeared over the side of the rocky
platform, and Saunders stretched to grab it.Just as Doc began hauling him in, Saunders felt the hairs on the back of
his neck stand on end.

“Doc!”
he gasped, overcome by a sudden sense of foreboding,
his skin crawling, his testicles retracting.“Let go!Get dow…!”

A tremendous explosion cut
off his words.Saunders slammed into the
rock face, the concussive force of the blast flattening him against it.A wall of heat broke over him, followed
instantly by shrapnel whistling past in all directions.Chunks of dirt and stones clanged into his
helmet, hit his back, and pelted his legs.Held in place only by Doc’s iron grip, Saunders hung stunned, disoriented,
helpless.

More hands grabbed at
him.They snagged his coat at his
shoulders, then pulling him forward, latched onto his belt.He scraped against the edge of the
outcropping as Doc and Littlejohn hauled him up and over it.Deposited on the floor of the stony shelf,
Saunders coughed the smoke and rock dust from his lungs, his ears ringing, his
arms and legs dead weight, his face streaked with blood.

He vaguely noted being
dragged farther from the ledge’s edge before Littlejohn let him go and dove
forward to lie alongside an anxious-looking Caje and
Kirby positioned a few feet away.Saunders groggily took in the three GIs as they turned to peer down the
hillside once more.A worried face
appeared above his own and muffled words filtered into
his ears.

“Sarge!” Doc hissed, trying to keep his voice down.“Sarge!Are you all right?Can you…?”Another blast rocked the hillside, and the medic threw himself forward
to cover him.

More shrapnel whizzed past
the ledge, this time slamming into the granite above them, chipping boulders,
and sending a shower of debris raining down on the prone GIs.Covered with dirt, they coughed into their
hands or the crooks of their arms as smoke poured into the cramped hideout.

Saunders blinked the soot
from his eyes and willed his mental cobwebs away, knowing he needed to
move.“Doc,” he croaked, “get off me.”

“You heard me!”Saunders pushed up to topple the medic off
him.Straining forward, he untangled
himself from Doc’s protection and crawled up next to Littlejohn.

Doc retreated to the rear of
the shelf, shaking his head, once more forced to do things the squad leader’s
way.He hated being hampered in his
work, but knew the danger of the situation and Saunders’ priorities.The war came first, then the sergeant’s
welfare.Doc hunkered lower, resigned to
his place in this man’s army, and bided his time.

Saunders fumbled for the
sling on his Thompson and pulled the weapon off his back.Bringing the gun around in front of him, he
stared at it bleary-eyed.

Kirby, lying on the other
side of Littlejohn, said, “Damn, Sarge.Looks like Lady Luck’s on your side.”

Saunders glanced at the
three men off to his left gaping at the four inch piece of steel protruding
from the weapon’s butt stock.Had the
shrapnel penetrated his back instead of the Tommygun,
they would have been minus a squad leader.

“Eyes forward,” Saunders
said thickly, his voice sounding oddly distant in his ears.“Watch for Krauts.”

They did as they were told,
and Saunders wrapped his fingers around the twisted metal.With a forceful tug, he pulled it out and
laid it aside.Retracting the Thompson’s
bolt, he checked the chamber, then levered the magazine catch and slid out the
box magazine.He depressed the
submachine gun’s trigger and racked the bolt back and
forth several more times to test the weapon’s mechanism.Satisfied he wouldn’t suffer a stoppage, he
reloaded the gun.Then trying not to think
about the pain radiating through his back and legs, he peered at their former
position.

Nearly blasted apart by the
direct hit of a Panzerschreck, the ledge looked like
it would have been the squad’s crypt had the GIs not abandoned it.Blackened craters, scattered boulders, and
scarred rock marked the spots where two rockets fired from the German bazooka
had each impacted, one of them a short distance below the other.Saunders realized that if he hadn’t been just
outside the lower one’s blast perimeter, he would have been killed.He wiped perspiration from his upper lip and
reached for some snow.Scooping a
handful into his mouth, he turned his attention to the Krauts.

The Panzergrenadiers
were working their way up the hill, to mop up.When they finally got in close enough, they charged the ruined
outcropping, firing rifles and yelling battle cries.Banking on the success of their bazooka man,
they expected to find little, if anything, left of the bushwhacking Amis.Instead, the first Germans to reach the ledge
found themselves in the middle of another slaughterhouse.

Saunders opened up with the
Thompson to butcher two of them.Kirby’s
BAR chopped up half a dozen more.Caje and Littlejohn cut into the soldiers nearby as their
shrill cries filled the air.

The Germans farther down the
slope bellowed curses and hit the dirt.A
furious group leader shouted orders.The
SS men went into action.

Bullets ricocheted off
rocks, splintered saplings, and shredded bushes as the Grenadiers’ weapons snapped
and snarled.Saunders’ men ducked in and
out of the protection of the outcropping to return fire.Spent cartridges flew in every direction,
scorching clothing and landing to lie steaming in the snow.

More Germans moved up with
the MG42.They let the machine gun rip
as two Grenadiers tried a flanking movement.Caje risked showing himself
to shoot their legs out from under them.Another soldier rose with an egg grenade, and Saunders felled him
too.The grenade’s blast obscured the
Germans’ view, and Kirby took advantage of the cover.He opened up with the BAR again, keeping the
rifle chugging in short bursts so it stayed level as he tore up the hillside
with lead.His murderous fire forced the
rest of the Krauts to keep their heads down.

Seeing this, Saunders
yelled, “Littlejohn!Grenades!”

The soldier pulled out two
grenades and sent them sailing down the incline.Their thunderous explosions bagged him the
machine gun.Their deadly fragments
produced screams.

“Caje!”

The scout grabbed the pair
of grenades clipped to his belt.He
lobbed one into a crevice and the other one past a jumble of boulders.The back-to-back blasts wiped out two more
knots of Grenadiers.

Saunders’ turn came
next.While his men kept up the
blistering fire he winged McCall’s grenades at an outcropping farther
below.Geysers of smoke and steel shot
into the air as the deafening explosions blew apart the soldiers crouched
there.

It was enough for the
surviving SS men.Stunned by the
concussions, pelted with a ghastly shower of body parts, and losing the uphill
battle, they withdrew on the run.The
Americans gunned down those they could see, strafing the fog with slugs until
the last man vanished into it.

Saunders, snapping up his
Thompson, yelled, “Hold your fire!”

The men did so, and Saunders
heard a German commander shouting in the distance.He knew a counterattack would be in the works
soon.That meant there was no time to
spare.

“Gimme
an ammo check,” Saunders ordered.

Caje swept his eyes over the
empty bandolier lying in front of him before fumbling at his belt.“Three clips.”

Kirby jerked a thumb
sideways.“I got what Littlejohn’s carryin’.”

Littlejohn looked up and
shook his head.“Kirby’s got two mags, but I’m out.”

Saunders patted down his
coat, ran a hand over the magazine pocket looped to his web belt, then checked his ammunition pouch.Nothing for the Tommy.Two magazines for the Colt holstered at his
side.

There were also the
cartridges already loaded in everyone’s weapons.Plus Kirby’s grenades.

A damned
small amount of ordnance.

“Okay.All of you,” Saunders barked, “up the
hill!To the top.Now!”

The men lifted themselves,
snatched up rifles, and scattered.

Saunders pushed up, but
still woozy from the Panzerschreck blast, reeled like
a punch-drunk fighter.Instantly, the
company medic was at his side.

“C’mon, Sarge.You better
let me give you a hand.”

Before Saunders could reply,
Doc ducked under the squad leader’s left arm and propelled him forward.Saunders staggered alongside the aid man toward
a series of boulders littering the slope like stepping stones.Burning sensations running up the back of
Saunders’ legs caused him to wonder if he had taken some fragments in his
calves.The pain in his back hadn’t
lessened either.Only with the medic’s help
did he reach the stones.

Before navigating them, he paused.“Hold on, Doc.”

“What is it?”

Saunders didn’t answer but
pulled away to loop the Tommygun’s sling over his
shoulder.

Doc raised an eyebrow at the
sight of the submachine gun falling across Saunders’ spine.“Givin’ yourself cover?”

Saunders cast him a sidelong
glance, then cracked a smile.“Gotta
watch my back.”

Doc snorted, and Saunders
slung his left arm over the medic’s shoulders once more.“Gotta
get out of here too.”

“I’m with you,” Doc said.

The two men leaned forward
and began struggling up the stones.

The soldiers grappling with
the craggy rocks higher on the slope had nearly reached its crest when the
first mortar round hit.

Kirby lost his footing and
went down.Clinging to the granite
beneath him, he twisted around to see if anyone was in trouble.

Littlejohn, plowing up the
slope behind the smaller man, plucked him off the rock by his suspenders.“What are you doing?” Littlejohn hollered.“Get up and get moving!”

“But Sarge
is down there!” Kirby shouted as another shell burst, closer this time. “What if he needs help?”

“Doc’s got him!He’s coming!”

A third explosion roared
across the landscape.

“What about Caje?” Kirby wanted to know next.

Littlejohn looked
around.“I don’t know; I can’t see him.”

“He was right behind me,
over there!”

“Well, he’s not now…”

Two more rounds crashed into
the ridge and Kirby tried to stop.

Littlejohn held on and kept
him moving.“You’re the getaway man!”

“He’s a dead man if the
Krauts walk those mortars over him!”

“And we will be too, if the
Krauts get our range!”

Littlejohn let go of Kirby
anyway, thrust the last BAR magazines into his hands, and began descending the
slope, off to the right.

“Where’re you goin’?” Kirby yelled.

“To find Caje!” Littlejohn yelled back.

Kirby made a move to follow,
but just then Saunders and Doc emerged from another bank of haze lower on the
hillside.

Saunders spotted the BAR man
and shouted, “Kirby!Get up the hill!”

Kirby lost his footing and
fell a second time as the ground shook with the concussion of multiple
explosions.The mortar rounds ascending
the ridge burst apart the saplings at the sergeant’s back, and Saunders yelled
again.

“Get up there!”

Kirby picked himself up and
threw himself forward.If the 81s didn’t
catch up with him, Saunders would, and Kirby knew disregarding an order would
mean hell to pay.He decided he’d better
let Littlejohn find Caje, on his own.Kirby just hoped the guy would do it before
the Krauts blew the whole ridge to kingdom come.

Littlejohn hoped so
too.Shouting Caje’s
name, he stumbled along the incline, trying to catch a glimpse of the scout
through the thick smoke obscuring everything.He coughed and gagged on the cordite filling his lungs.A sudden whiffling
sound warned him of an incoming shell, and Littlejohn threw himself behind a
boulder just as the round impacted nearby.Jagged pieces of shrapnel thrown up and out in a conical spray slashed
apart the shrubs and weeds on both sides of his refuge.

Littlejohn cringed.If another mortar hit that close, Caje wouldn’t be the only one missing.There wouldn’t be enough left of him to
scrape into a helmet.He had to get to
higher ground.He pushed away from the
rock and, hearing the faint sound of mortar tubes coughing out more shells in
the meadow below, dove for the incline.Scratching and clawing his way to its top, he continued to yell Caje’s name, but only another series of explosions roared a
response at his back.

On the crown of the ridge,
Littlejohn got to his feet and started running.Branches of silver pines pummeled him as he zigged
and zagged his way through the trees toward the
hogback’s reverse slope.He strained to
catch sight of the other squad members and worried about not having a fall back position for a rendezvous.When the Krauts advanced again he would be in
a bad way if they caught him out here, by himself, with only two rounds left in
his rifle.

Littlejohn eventually
reached the west slope and began descending several hundred feet of steep
terrain.His eyes roved back and forth
constantly, searching for signs of his outfit.When a slight breeze began cooling his face, he realized he was
approaching a clearing.Through thinning
trees he saw a field in front of him.Barren, frozen, littered with stalks, it looked silent, empty…and
dangerous.

Littlejohn paused.Where were the others?He had reached the base of the hill.He should have seen some sign of them by now.But not only did it seem they hadn’t been on
the slope, it was also obvious they hadn’t crossed the field.No tracks showed in the snow.

He decided he wouldn’t cross
the open area either.It was too
risky.It might be mined.Or zeroed in by the Krauts.If he stepped a toe out there he was liable
to get an 88 down his throat.

He wheeled around.Maybe he’d missed something.Like a trail somewhere…a deer run.One that was still being
used and didn’t have much snow on it.That would be a logical route for the other guys to take.Especially if they were
being followed.It would
camouflage their movements.It would be
free of anti-personnel mines.

It might be taking them in a
different direction.

Littlejohn frowned.Were they going north? he
wondered.Or
northwest?He had been moving due
west, but maybe that was a mistake.

Scratching his neck,
Littlejohn squatted in the brush.He had
to think.What had he passed on his way
here?Anything that
looked like a path?A drainage ditch?A culvert?

He reached for his bayonet
and fixed it to his rifle.It wasn’t
much security, but it was nearly all the weapon he had.If one or two Krauts showed up, he might be
able to take them out if he got the drop on them.But if more than a pair came along…

A series of twigs
snapped.Footsteps sounded.Someone was coming!Littlejohn looked around quickly.He had no cover here.The trees were too thin.Whoever was out there…heading his way…would
see him!

He spotted a tree
trunk.A thick one.If he could get to it in
time…

Too late.Dark figures descending the hillside loomed
out of the fog.More
than two of them.Coming in fast.

Littlejohn snapped off the
safety on his rifle.Blood roared in his
ears.He would have to shoot the ones in
front, then get in some quick thrusts with the bayonet
before anyone noticed he wasn’t just another shrub growing among the weeds.

He
reviewed the techniques for using the bayonet he had practiced recently while
the company was in reserve and being drilled for close combat in the Huertgen.

Basic Thrust.Littlejohn
swallowed.Drive the bayonet in a straight line to any unprotected part of your
opponent’s body.

One
of the men approaching appeared to slip and grabbed for the trunk of a nearby
tree.

Side-step Thrust.Littlejohn brought up his
rifle.Bend both knees, move to the right or left, step in quickly, and drive
the bayonet into your opponent’s throat or chest.

The men behind the soldier
at the tree helped him regain his balance before they all continued forward.

Low-body Thrust.Littlejohn tightened his leg
muscles.Do this move the same way as you would the side-step thrust, but target
the lower part of your opponent’s body.

The
soldiers’ features were becoming more distinct.

Body-contact Thrust.Littlejohn held his breath.Hold
your rifle close to yourself, with the tip of the bayonet facing a little bit
to the right, then lunge forward and knock your opponent off balance so you can
stab him before he recovers.

The soldiers were
practically on top of him.

Littlejohn couldn’t believe
it.

“Safe!” he said.

“Shit,” the lead man
blurted, falling backward.

Saunders and Doc managed to
stop just in time to keep from tripping over him.

Littlejohn stood, wearing a
look of total relief on his face.“That’s the wrong password, Kirby.”

“Dammit, Sarge!”Kirby twisted around to see the NCO.“If he does that one more time I’m gonna…!”

“Next
time, Kirby.”Saunders looked pained and
tired.He turned his attention to
Littlejohn.“You by
yourself?”

Littlejohn took in the other
men and hesitated.He hated to answer
the question, seeing Caje wasn’t with them, but lowering
his eyes, he admitted, “Yeah.You guys
are the only ones I’ve run into.”

Kirby gained his legs and
said, “You mean Cajeain’t
here?”

“I couldn’t find him.The smoke was…”

Kirby pushed past Doc and
was nearly around Saunders before the sergeant grabbed the rifleman’s arm.

“Where do you think you’re
going?”

“To get Caje!”

“Littlejohn already
tried.Forget it.”

“But, Sarge…!”

“I said, forget it!”
Saunders snapped.

Kirby’s eyes blazed as he
appraised the squad leader, but he backed down.

Saunders released him and
turned back to Littlejohn.“What do you
mean you ‘couldn’t find him?’”

“Well, I was behind Kirby
when we were climbing.And Caje was somewhere off to our right.But when the mortars started coming in, Kirby
and I lost sight of him.We figured he
might need help or something, so I went down the hill, to find out.But it was no use; I couldn’t see a
thing.Then the rounds started hitting
awfully close, and I went back up the hill and have been looking for you guys
since.”

Saunders felt lightheaded
and wondered if it was due only to the thin mountain air.“You sure Caje
wasn’t ahead of you two when the barrage started?”

“Not sure.
”Littlejohn shrugged.“But I haven’t seen any tracks to prove he
was…or that he is now.”

Mortars continued to pound
the east side of the ridge, and Saunders frowned.

“Sarge, maybe one of
us…”

“All of us are moving out,
Doc,”Saunders
said.“Now.”

“You ain’t
just gonna leave Caje back
there!” Kirby exclaimed.

“We don’t know that he is back there.And no one else is walking into Kraut mortars
or a firing line to find out.”

“But it wouldn’t be no sweat to…”

“Dammit, Kirby!”Saunders
took a threatening step toward him.“Get
over there, on the point, keep to the woods, and move northwest.Now!”

Kirby jerked up the BAR,
turned on his heel, and stalked off.

Saunders jabbed the Thompson
in the direction Kirby had taken.“Go on, Littlejohn.Move out.”He looked to his
left.“You too, Doc.”

The medic hesitated, then
nodded and fell in behind Littlejohn.

Saunders brought up the end
of the line, stewing over the last time he’d let a couple of squad members look
for a man down in a barrage.With the
Germans advancing, the pair had nearly wound up MIA while the object of their
search had surfaced, bandaged by civilians, a couple of miles away.Even though Saunders wanted to go back for Caje, he wouldn’t risk losing more men - men low on
ammunition and so at high risk – the same way, a second time.

Now their survival was his
bottom line.

Snow began falling, and soon
the flurries became an all too familiar storm.Fat, wet flakes coated the soldiers as they plodded toward the
Dasburg-Bastogne Highway.Silent and
brooding, they watched every tree they approached, every swale they
skirted.They strained to see Germans,
but hoped they would run into another American outfit.Being so isolated while the squad was two men
down didn’t sit very well with any of them.

The farther the GIs
traveled, the more the sergeant’s legs hurt until, finally,
he called a halt.He and the others had
covered nearly half a mile of rolling, wooded country interspersed with meadows
where shepherds brought Leicester sheep to graze during the summer months.Saunders decided the ruins of a long-gone
mountain shack’s foundation would provide the squad defilade so they could take
a break.He didn’t say it, but he also
hoped Caje would show up if they waited for him.

Stepping into the
rectangular depression in the ground, outlined by ancient fieldstone overgrown
with ice-covered brush, the soldiers fell out.Saunders hobbled to an empty corner, and immediately, Doc was at his side.

“It’s time I take a look at
you,” he said.

“I’m okay,” Saunders replied
automatically, lowering himself next to a boulder.

“I know you are.”Doc reached for Saunders’ arm, to assist
him.“That’s why this’ll only take a
minute.”

Doc got Saunders seated, then knelt and slipped the strap of his medical bag
off his shoulder.He set the bag in the
snow, pulled off his gloves, and reached for Saunders’ left leg.Pulling the limb toward himself, he rotated
it and peered at the spots of blood staining the back of Saunders’ ODs.Releasing the leg, he repeated the process
with Saunders’ other one.

Saunders watched the cursory
examination in silence, resigned to his need for aid.He reached into his coat for a smoke.

“I’m not gonna
be able work like this,” Doc said, looking up.“You wanna get on your belly so I can see what
I’m doin’?”

Saunders frowned but
returned the cigarette to its pack and leaned forward to stretch out.For a brief moment his eyes met Kirby’s, and Saunders
read the accusation there - that Caje…and McCall
before him…had been abandoned without so much as a second look back.Looking away, Saunders forced himself to
reject the charge and concentrated on masking his pain…without being entirely successful
at either task.

“Here, Sarge,
you’d better take it slower,” Doc said, reaching to
provide him with support as Saunders finished lowering himself onto his
stomach.“You feelin’ hurt anywhere else besides your legs?”

Saunders hated to admit he
was having so much trouble and so further worry the men, but he confessed, “My
back.The right side.”

Doc frowned and gave
Saunders’ coat a quick once-over.Except
for some small tears, he didn’t see anything that indicated a wound.He let go of Saunders’ arm and moved in
closer to make another examination.“How
‘bout reachin’ up and undoin’
your belt and some coat buttons so I can get a better look at things?”

Saunders did as he was
asked, and Doc flipped the clothing back.Some small pieces of metal trapped between the overcoat and sweater and
shirts underneath dropped off to Saunders’ side.Shaking his head in wonder, Doc lifted the
sweater and tugged Saunders’ shirts out of the waistband of the sergeant’s
pants.

Doc knew the fragments
explained the tears in the coat.The
shrapnel must’ve lost momentum by the time it got through Saunders’ heavy
outerwear.But what was causing the
man’s pain?

Doc carefully lifted the
shirts to expose Saunders’ back and saw a large patch of discolored skin
bearing the rough shape of the Thompson’s stock, running down the right side of
the sergeant’s spine.

“You look like you got hit
with a two by four,” Doc commented, leaning forward to cautiously probe along
Saunders’ shoulder blades and his ribcage, to determine the extent of the
injury.

“I feel like I got hit with
a two by four,” Saunders said before stiffening suddenly.

“My hands
cold?”Doc paused.

Saunders’ voice was
tight.“Yeah.”

“Well, I’ll make this
fast.”Doc lifted the shirts higher to
peer at the smaller marks dotting Saunders’ back.After making sure there was no broken skin,
he announced, “I’d say, except for your legs, you’re okay.It just looks like you’ve got some pretty
nice bruises started.The shrapnel that
hit your Tommy, plus a few of those rocks, must’ve really walloped you good.”

Saunders began shivering and
wished the medic would finish.

Doc lowered the shirts and
pulled Saunders’ coat over him once more.Moving backward, he worked on his patient’s calves.He reached into his bag for scissors and
carefully cut the right leg of Saunders’ trousers to scrutinize the holes in
and spots of blood on the long johns underneath.By the size of both, Doc decided the wounds
probably weren’t serious.

“I’d say you took a few
slivers from the bazooka round too.”He
began cutting the long johns.“But I’ll
see if I can dig ‘em out and get you patched up.”

Saunders winced when Doc
eventually began probing with forceps.He decided to try again for a smoke.He rose onto his elbows, retrieved a cigarette, and lit it while studying
the woods.The Thompson lay by his side,
and he pulled it around in front of himself.He didn’t know if he’d need it in the next few minutes, but he wasn’t
about to take any chances.

“Got one,” Doc said in triumph.

Saunders turned his head and
caught sight of Kirby staring at him.The BAR man looked as if he were chiseled in stone.Saunders swallowed his discomfort and asked
the medic, “What about the rest of ‘em?”

“I think they’ll come out
just as easy,” Doc assured him.

“Good,” Kirby muttered.“Because we don’t wanna have to leave him behind too.”

Saunders became angry but
didn’t say anything.

Doc did instead.“Hey, Sarge,” he
said casually, still engrossed in his work.“Why don’t I speak to Captain Elsbourne when
we get back, and ask about settin’ up some of the men
for another short arm?”He aimed the
forceps at the next fragment embedded in the skin showing above Saunders’
boot.“After all, with the company bein’ on relief the last couple of weeks, I imagine some of
the guys are about due for an inspection.”

Kirby pulled in his legs and
turned back to the firs.“Huh,” he
grunted as he hunched forward and slid his fingertips under his helmet to tug
his jeep cap lower over his ears.

Saunders almost smiled, but
a sudden stinging sensation got him wincing again.Doc extracted the second fragment from the
sergeant’s leg and looked up to wink at an ill-at-ease Littlejohn.

The unexpected sound of
someone forcing his way through the trees interrupted the GIs.

“Safe!” Kirby nearly shouted
as three weapons jerked up to shoot the intruder.

A man stumbled out of the
pines and lurched toward the hiding place, his hands raised, his chest heaving
as he coughed and gasped for air.

“Son of a gun,” Kirby
cried.“It’s Caje!”He vaulted from cover and grabbed hold of the
soldier to keep him on his feet.The two
men staggered toward the abandoned foundation, and Littlejohn stood to help Caje into it.

Once inside, Caje lifted the sling of his rifle looped over the bayonet
sheathed at his hip, fell to his knees, and collapsed in the center of the
shallow depression.

Caje shook his head.“I’m…all right,” he panted.“All…”He coughed again and turned his face away from the medic.

“Are you sure?” Doc asked, unwilling
to believe he was being told the truth.He had served with King Company guys long enough to know that some of
them tended to give him the brush off, whether due to an exaggerated sense of
bravado or, more likely, just plain stubbornness about admitting they needed
help.And Caje,
over the last few days, had been one of them.

Caje nodded and waved him off,
too winded to do anything else.

“Well, why don’t you let me…”

“Doc,” Saunders
interrupted.“He said he’s okay.”He crushed out his cigarette and threw the
butt off to his side.Seeing Doc’s
worry, Saunders’ expression softened.“Just give him some time, huh?”

Doc took in the sergeant’s
bloodied face and agreed.“Okay, Sarge,” he said, patting Caje’s
shoulder before moving away from him.He
crawled back to Saunders.“I guess I oughta finish up with you anyway.”

The sergeant gritted his
teeth as Doc began working on him again.Looking at his watch, Saunders was relieved the medic was taking care of
his other leg.If Caje
was really okay, they’d have to get a move on.The Krauts might be right behind him.Saunders waited another couple of minutes, then
asked, “Is anyone following you?”

Caje rolled onto his side.“Not that I know of.”He was still flushed and out of breath but pushed
himself up, moved closer to one of the sides of the foundation, and pulled his
Garand into his lap.“I was afraid of
losing your tracks though.”

“The
snow?”

“Yeah.”Caje fumbled in his
coat for a cigarette.

“Being on your own in these
woods is rough.”

Caje nodded at Littlejohn.“You said it.”

“You want to tell me what
happened?”

“Sure, Sarge.When the
mortars started dropping, I slipped and lost my rifle.It seemed like it slid halfway back down the
hill.Took me forever
to get it.”Caje
shook his head at the memory and lit his cigarette.“Then a Kraut lieutenant - who must’ve been
playing dead after one of us winged him - took a shot at me from farther down
the slope.I plugged him, then checked to make sure he was out of action.And when I did…” Caje
paused to fish in his coat again, “I found this on him.”He pulled out a piece of paper and extended
it forward.

“A map?”Saunders took the document.

“Yeah.”

Kirby couldn’t wait any
longer.“How’d you keep from gettin’ hit by those mortars?” he asked.

Caje shrugged.“I don’t know.The Krauts must’ve been concentratingtheir fire toward the four of you, so
they missed me.Once I got the map, I
kept going down the hill since going up would’ve been suicide.Then I cut across it until I hit some
woods.After that I started climbing
again.”

“Well, don’t that beat all,”
Kirby said, shaking his head in wonder.“And here I was all ready to go back for you.”He laughed.“If it hadn’t’ve been
for Sarge, I probably would’ve got myself clobbered
for noth…”For
the third time his eyes met Saunders’, and this time Kirby was the first to
look away.“Well, I’m glad you caught up
to us,” he finished soberly.

Caje nodded again.

Doc spoke.“Sarge, I think I
got the last of ‘em.Another few minutes and you’ll be almost good as new.”He reached for sulfanilamide and bandages.

Saunders twisted
around.“I said that’s it.Get your gear together.”He reached back and pulled his trousers’ leg
down over a trio of bandages and the bruises showing on his left calf.Jamming the pants back into his boot tops, he
said to the others, “All of you.Off and on.Now.”

Kirby and Littlejohn stood.

Caje was slower to rise, and
after gathering up the medical bag, Doc assisted him.

“You sure you’re okay?”

“Fine, Doc.Just tired.”

Kirby stepped past them and
reached Saunders’ side just as the sergeant finished buckling his boots.

“Sarge?Can I give
you a hand?”

Saunders paused but didn’t
answer.Instead, he leaned forward painfully
and collected his pistol belt.He pulled
it around himself and fastened it in place.Snagging the sling on his Thompson, he reeled in the gun and snugged it in tight under his right arm.He checked to make sure the map was still
tucked safely inside his coat, then he looked up and
raised his other arm.

Kirby grabbed it and helped
Saunders to his feet.He said quietly,
“Thanks.”

“Yeah,” Saunders told him in
a flat voice.

Kirby pursed his lips but caught
the warmth in the sergeant’s eyes and smiled.

Littlejohn piped up to ask, “Sarge, are we gonna try for Marnach again?”

Saunders turned his way and
said, “No, we might only end up wasting more time.And the Krauts could have the comm wire cut and radio frequencies jammed.”

“But won’t the company be
there?” Caje asked.

“Yeah, but that map needs to
go back to regiment.”

The men looked at each
other.

“So where’re we goin’?” Kirby asked, knowing that Saunders would simply
confirm what the rest of them knew already.

“The same place we started
from,” Saunders answered, moving toward the foundation wall opposite him and
worrying about the information he had seen.He raised a hand to look at his watch and frowned at how soon it would get
dark.